Dogtooth (2009)
Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos
Three teenagers are confined to an isolated country estate that could very well be on another planet. The trio spend their days listening to endless homemade tapes that teach them a whole new vocabulary. Any word that comes from beyond their family abode is instantly assigned a new meaning. Hence 'the sea' refers to a large armchair and 'zombies' are little yellow flowers. Having invented a brother whom they claim to have ostracized for his disobedience, the uber-controlling parents terrorize their offspring into submission.
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7 films that influenced Dogtooth
What critics say influenced Dogtooth
The film’s provocative conceit and the cold-blooded precision of its violence recall Michael Haneke, particularly Funny Games and Time Of The Wolf, but Lanthimos has a prankish sense of humor, and favors an offhand absurdity that aligns him closer to Luis Buñuel.
The film’s provocative conceit and the cold-blooded precision of its violence recall Michael Haneke, particularly Funny Games and Time Of The Wolf, but Lanthimos has a prankish sense of humor, and favors an offhand absurdity that aligns him closer to Luis Buñuel.
Dogtooth is at its most sublimely absurd when the parents are interpreting phenomena like passing airplanes or Frank Sinatra's recording of "Come Fly with Me"; it's at its best when it hovers between the trauma of Pier Paolo Pasolini's Salò and the creepiness of Michael Haneke's The Seventh Continent.
Probably an evolved form of the style and judgment usual dished out by Michael Haneke (who I do like, despite both Funny Games).
The film’s provocative conceit and the cold-blooded precision of its violence recall Michael Haneke, particularly Funny Games and Time Of The Wolf, but Lanthimos has a prankish sense of humor, and favors an offhand absurdity that aligns him closer to Luis Buñuel.
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Co-writing the script with Efthymis Filippou, Lanthimos appropriates wisely from other tales about children separated from the real world like Ian McEwan's The Cement Garden and M. Night Shyamalan's The Village while introducing a welcome dose of dark, twisted comedy.
“We accept the reality of the world which we are presented,” says Ed Harris’ reality-TV puppetmaster in The Truman Show.
-Eric Henney (RB, 7/14, 10pm) Big Tits Zombie 3-D Though it's cause for international celebration based on title alone, Takao Nakano's answer to Jenna Jameson vehicle Zombie Strippers!