Dog: Neon NZ Review

Dog knows exactly what it wants to do - the pitch is right there in front of an audience.

Channing Tatum, a dog and a road trip to a fallen comrade's funeral. It's all laid out in that simple synopsis - and it's cemented by the opening credits which provide a snapshot of the relationship between the dog Lulu and its military owner, who's died.

And yet for a film whose premise isn't exactly earth-shattering, or whose denouement is never in doubt, Dog makes the conventional road seem appealing enough for its 100 minute run time.

Tatum is Jackson Briggs, a former Army Ranger, who's been cast aside from the service due to a combination of post traumatic stress disorder and also a brain injury that could leave him prone to seizures. Desperate for money, and scrabbling to make ends meet after working at a gas station, Briggs is offered a shot at redemption - if he can take the hot-headed pooch Lulu to his former Ranger's funeral.

But Briggs is not the only suffering from PTSD, as Lulu isn't exactly an easy passenger in the planned road trip.

Episodic in structure, and oddly atonal, Dog is a film that isn't quite sure that it wants to be.

On the one hand, it offers plenty of Instagrammable vistas with Tatum's Briggs posing next to a dog as they trek across America to make the funeral; but on the other, it sees the dog attack a Muslim in a hotel because that's what it's programmed to do. Add into that mix a run in with a pair of hippy hillbilly weed dealers in the hills, a hipster duo of mediums who Briggs tries to have a threesome with, a section with a veteran dog handler and lot of Briggs talking his feelings out to Lulu while driving, and you can see how the film's patchwork quilt of ambition doesn't quite match with its execution.

Tatum doesn't exactly challenge himself here - both in front of and behind the camera, but he does allow a degree of vulnerability to creep into his portrayal of Briggs aimed at clearly tugging the heartstrings of the audience. 

dog is easy viewing in extremis, however one can't help but feel that the story could have been beefed up into a more interesting way of tackling PTSD, one which doesn't have every single beat signposted from a great distance away. Its muted catharsis is a victim of this, and epilogue scenes feel somewhat unearned, relationships repaired when they seemed damaged by assumption early on and a lack of drama within. It jumps to conclusions rather than fully concentrating on the journey and ultimately disengages the audience that may be looking for more swoon-worthy shots of tight T-shirts, rugged jawlines and pet pooches.

Dog isn't a bad film at all, despite an obviously mawkish sentimental end - it's just one that's confused in its execution and in its audience expectations as well. It's not exactly ruff, but it's not as smooth a ride as its very simple premise initially lays out.