Dogtooth (2009)

“I hope your kids have bad influences and develop bad personalities. I wish this with all my heart”.

- Father.

Dogtooth – ★★★★

Since I’ve already wrote a review for this movie for my other blog, I thought I should stop by here and post a translated version of it (don’t worry, I didn’t use Google Translator!). Simply because this movie is brilliant… and Greek, which means you’ll only watch it if you *really* want to.  And I should warn you, it is not a movie for everybody. But then again I already wrote here about The Night Porter, Intimacy, and many other “weird” films so here it goes:

Winner of the Un Certain Regard Award in Cannes 2009, the Greek film Dogtooth (Kynodontas) didn’t get my attention until I came upon The Playlist’s “2010: The Best Films of the Year…So Far” (click here to read the post). After watching the trailer I knew that I would simply love the film. It would be as twisted and bizarre as it could be and it would make me think for a long time after the credits finished rolling. And guess what? I was right.

The plot is about this overprotective couple that decides to shield their children from the world as we know it and isolate them in their house, far away from neighbors and the big city. There they teach the “kids” (they look to be in their late twenties) that they cannot – under any circumstances – leave their home territory before their dogtooth grow and then fall again. Completely INSANE! There’s no television (well, there is but only connected to the VCR where they watch home made films), no phones, nor the definition of words such as c*nt and zombies in their vocabulary. The only contact with the outside world comes through the character Christina, a woman who works as a security in the father’s company and is payed to go to their house and have sexual relations with the son. Have I mentioned this movie is bizarre?

You have no idea, dear wicked reader, it’s probably worse than you can imagine. I wish I was the one who had written this film, since it’s very unique. And that’s why it’s so good, so brilliant. Half the time your jaw is on the floor, you can’t believe what you’re seeing and will probably burst with laughter because the situation is so absurd, so surreal. The other half you’ll want to close your eyes and be mad by all the cruelty imposed upon these kids.

I don’t want to give any anything away so I won’t comment on specific scenes, and I feel a big part of the experience of watching such a film comes from not knowing much about it (although I do recommend watching the trailer first, so you won’t blame me afterwards if you think it’s not you cup of tea).

ps: Possibly rated as NC-17, so consider yourself warned: Mature audience only! Otherwise you’ll be traumatized for life (not really, but let’s be dramatic about it!).

Dogtooth trailer