With: Caleb Landry Jones, Jojo T. Gibbs, Christopher Denham, Clemens Schick, John Charles Aguilar, Grace Palma, Iris Bry, Marisa Berenson, Lincoln Powell, Alexander Settineri, Michael Garza, Bianca Melgar, C.C. DeNeira, Joe Sheridan, Emeric Bernard-Jones, Kyran Peet, Cameron Alexander, Jérémy Finet, Tom Leeb, Eric Carter, Jeff Mantel
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Written by: Luc Besson
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Directed by: Luc Besson
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MPAA Rating: R for violent content, language and brief drug use
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Running Time: 113
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Date: 03/29/2024
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On the Bark Side
By Jeffrey M. Anderson
One of Luc Besson's stranger movies, DogMan is sometimes preposterous, but even more frequently thrilling, and it's even touching, thanks to its gentle, terribly wounded central performance.
Douglas "Doug" Munrow (Caleb Landry Jones) is arrested, wearing a Marilyn Monroe outfit, bloodied and bruised, and with a truckload of dogs. Speaking with psychiatrist Evelyn Decker (Jojo T. Gibbs), he reveals that he survived a horribly abusive childhood, forced to live in a dog kennel by his evil father, and his legs rendered nearly useless by a gunshot wound.
He grew up lonely, finding solace in his special bond with the dogs, and performing lip-syncs while dressed as famous women. He moved into an abandoned building and learned to get by trading favors with people, using his dogs, for example, to shake down a local gangster, El Verdugo (John Charles Aguilar) to get him to stop collecting protection money. Eventually, Douglas's cozy setup is endangered when a nosy insurance adjuster (Christopher Denham) starts investigating a robbery and El Verdugo comes looking for revenge.
DogMan takes a cue from the 2005 movie Unleashed, which Besson wrote and produced, following another solitary warrior who has survived abuse (and being caged) and finds a kind of solace. But unlike Jet Li and his martial arts mastery, Caleb Landry Jones — perhaps best known for memorable character parts in Get Out and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri — finds other ways to tackle life's hurdles.
His amazing performance as Douglas is remarkably quiet, as his expressive eyes ooze pain; he's resigned to his situation, and he has found peace with it. His bond with the dogs is believable, even if some of their tricks strain credibility (in one scene, they fetch ingredients for Douglas to bake a cake).
Besson's skill as one of our great pulp filmmakers is as slick as ever, finding just the right minor playful tone to sugarcoat the violence. (There's even some Shakespeare in it!) It has the feel and pacing of some of best movies, including La Femme Nikita and Léon. He's not subtle, but it works; when Douglas's brother hands a sign reading "IN THE NAME OF GOD" on the young boy's cage, he reads it backward, seeing "DOG" instead.
Even so, it's edgy enough to be potentially off-putting to many viewers, including animal lovers (dogs are sometimes threatened or in jeopardy and dogs ruthlessly kill bad humans), but for fans of Besson and those looking for something out of the ordinary, DogMan is highly recommended.
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