Review by
Benjamin Poole
Directed by: Guan Hu
Starring: Eddie Peng, Tong Liya, Jia Zhangke, Zhang Yi, Zhou You
Guan Hu and Ge Rui's (director/ co-scripter)
Black Dog, the winner of this year's Un Certain Regard, opens upon a dirty-blue
washed vista of distant jagged mountains and shrub-mottled scrubland. As
the camera gently pans right across the landscape, tumbleweeds roll
through the frame, clarifying the Western genre intentions of this
establishing sequence. From top left, a bus has trundled into view just as
a pack of rushing dogs emerge from the screen's lower right; the vehicle
barely makes it to the focal point before turning recklessly to avoid the
animals, spinning upside down into a cloud of thick Gobi desert dust. The
startling, almost comic, imagery ignites Black Dog's fable like narrative.
Among the dishevelled passengers is former stunt motorcyclist Lang (Eddie Peng), who, after a decade in the big house, is returning to his hometown on
the desert's periphery. Lang was once a local celebrity, but things have
changed in his absence: the town has ruinously fallen into economic
doldrums, his father is an alcoholic, and the townsfolk eye him with
prejudice for his involvement in the death of local mafioso Butcher Hu's
nephew. "You’ll pay for your crimes," a drive-by abuser shouts at Lang;
and as a disgraced protagonist with something to prove, Lang has the
potential to fulfil a genre archetype of redemption. Tidying up the town
in the hope of economic rejuvenation during the forthcoming Beijing 2008
Olympics, a ragbag team scours the streets capturing the stray dogs
(abandoned by their owners when they absconded) running wild within. Lang
becomes a part of this posse, a group who speak in tones of a particularly
dangerous dark canine...
Within this deliciously b-movie premise (yet to come is a beautiful
dancer, Grape, played by Tong Liya, from a travelling circus- ! –
whom Lang has a relationship with), the dogs, especially the titular
hound, provide warmth and humanity which juxtaposes the expressively
broken brutalism of the locations. After all, there's a reason for the
doesthedogdie.com
website, which is that dogs are ace and they live in our hearts. This lot
are just gorgeous, each one, all breeds and types who maraud the bleak
utilitarian playground of the town in united packs (I couldn't help
thinking how much fun these dogs must have had on set; running, playing
chase, having all that lovely fuss). The hunt has an element of farce,
with the crew using the sort of massive nets butterfly catchers had in old
cartoons and at one point Black Dog biting a man on the bottom... You half
expect to see a rogue dog emerge from a butchers with a string of sausages
in its mouth! (In the spirit of dtdd.com, be reassured that any diegetic
animal cruelty is committed off screen, and the team leader pointedly
commands his men to "try not to harm the animals"- phew!).
It's clear that Lang isn't cut out for collaring the uncollared, though.
As the power-drunk gang start to collect all dogs, even those who are not
stray, our man liberates the puppy of a heartbroken little girl and
returns it to her. He is some kind of man. The cast acquit their roles
within the remits of the genre context well, but the stand-out character
is the nominal pooch, a stringy whippet whose performance, once he is
caught, is deeply involving and beyond charming. Tasked with transporting
the notorious captive to the out of town holding pen, Lang experiences the
second car crash of the film: his van wiping out in the dusk of the
desert, leaving him stranded overnight. Unable to bear the plaintive
whines of the caged Black Dog, Lang frees the animal, who promptly attacks
him and takes up residence in the cab, leaving our hero outside to shiver
in the wind- haha!
The odd couple dynamic continues as Lang, in quarantine with the dog due
to threat of rabies, gradually accepts the animal into his life
(completely relatable: I do not even look at images of puppies for sale or
rescue dogs in case of irresponsibly rushing out to get yet another animal
☹). The gentle humour is tempered by an encroaching dread: the
no-dog-town simmers with threat as Butcher Hu enacts cruel punishments
upon his enemies from the confines of his snake farm (really!), and Lang
tends to his father while keeping Black Dog under wraps.
This existential Turner and Hooch reprise heads for
poignancy, with Lang having to face up to his misdemeanours while
co-operating with his cast of new, noirish acquaintances in a narrative
that is inventive and consistently entertaining. Throughout, however, the
contact Lang makes with humans proves to be transitory, and it is Black
Dog, and Lang's love for the animal, which truly transforms him: the
film's most sincere relationship. Not just a film for dog people,
Black Dog demonstrates how animals make us human.
Black Dog is in UK/ROI cinemas from
August 30th.
