Good Boy (2025)

Score: 4.5 / 5

Rare would I wish a film to be longer; rarer still that I felt it needed to be longer, but Good Boy deserves more room to breathe and play. It is, after all, about a dog.

When rumblings first appeared in social media about a horror movie from the perspective of a dog, I was worried. Frankly, given the recent rash of indie arthouse films toying with the idea of "found footage" visual approaches in fresh ways (like The Outwaters and Skinamarink), I assumed that this would be a handheld camera, low to the ground, shaky and limited, putting us in the dog's eyes. I still think there is room for that kind of film, but when the protagonist and narrator is an animal, it's very helpful to be able to see it. So creator Ben Leonberg wisely chooses instead to make a more conventionally shot film, and to make a star out of his very own good boy.

Much will be said about Indy, the dog who is indeed Indy in real life, owned by director Leonberg, who tells us in some behind-the-scenes footage during the credits that they shot this film in small bits over a very long time. Indy, to his credit, is emotive, but this project is primarily a success due to Leonberg's own editing, stitching together usable footage in a thoughtful, meaningful way that makes Indy feel much more communicative than a dog can really be on a film set. Especially one dealing with a haunted house and invisible stimuli. 

We're pretty much dumped into the story with minimal context, though Indy is clearly much-loved by his troubled human, Todd, whose poor health manifests in a serious lung disease that leaves him coughing up blood. Together, they flee urban New York City for an isolated house in the woods, owned by Todd's late grandfather. Todd's sister, Vera, calls him often, worried about his remote privacy and about the house itself, which is where their grandfather died, and family superstition more than suggests the place is haunted. Could it be dear old grandpappy himself, or is the house somehow "bad," even perhaps having caused their grandfather's death? If the house is to blame, it's also guilty of causing the disappearance of the grandfather's dog, a golden retriever named Bandit.

Right away, Indy can sense something is wrong with this house, hesitant to cross its threshold when first arriving. The cinematography may not put us in Indy's head, but we're severely limited by constantly moving around Indy, staring at him as things happen offscreen or in the background of shots. It's a beautiful approach, sometimes irritating, always meaningful. The film is barely over an hour in length, and within that, we're asked time and again to consider an otherwise straightforward genre film with a fraction of the information we're usually provided in extensive dialogue or action sequences. Indy often stares off into empty hallways and dark corners, reminding us of the inherently creepy reality that our pets sense things we don't -- and can't -- and what horrors might be avoided if we heed their peculiar mannerisms. 

The film is also not as cutesy and simple as I'm making it seem. Ingeniously, Leonberg allows flairs of fancy I absolutely did not expect, including dream sequences of what might happen in a dog's nightmare. Leonberg's subtle and strong use of special effects make it occasionally unclear about the differentiation, as a shadowy presence stalks Todd and Indy, between reality and fantasy. This makes Indy's behavior both relatable and brave, to the point that he sometimes charges headfirst down dark hallways or stairs to investigate strange sounds, while we in the auditorium are whispering for him to stop, to stay in the light, and not do the dumb thing we always criticize idiot teenagers in slashers for doing. But Indy has only one goal: to love and protect his human, just as Todd loves and protects him. Man's best friend, indeed.

Even when that man is becoming a monster. Either due to innate qualities finally taking over or the sinister influence of the house, Todd battles his illness, his sanity, and his darkest impulses in a curiously literate haunted house narrative. We're never quite sure of the nature of the haunting, as in the best of the genre; after all, in Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House or Henry James's The Turn of the Screw, are the people haunted, is the place haunted, is it about spirits or history or ideas, or is it an unholy combination about the unique particulars of time and place and personality? Such heady questions don't elude the grasp of this film, which nevertheless focuses our experience of horrors through sensory input we associate with the nonhuman subject. Too bad we can't smell this film.

Leonberg even suggests that Indy might be so stressed by the haunting, and in attempting to care for Todd, that he's an unreliable narrator, imagining ghostly presences. After all, Todd and Indy both watch old home videos of Todd's grandfather and Bandit back-to-back with cheap, direct-to-VHS horror flicks; could that imagery be messing with Indy's understanding of reality and informing his feverish nightmares? Yet by the film's admittedly terrifying climax, I was completely on board, rooting for Indy with an emotional investment I didn't even know I'd given him. Indy's smart and brave efforts to save Todd, even despite being mistreated by his master in thrall to a cruel spirit, are stronger than those of most horror protagonists. Moreover, the underscoring horror of a dependent dog being suddenly terrorized and abandoned by his owner is no small matter to contend with. We're forced into a unique headspace by the end of this film, which ends satisfyingly, though I won't spoil it for you. Indy deserves to show you himself.