It is the return of Luc Besson, after the accusations of rape against actress Sand Van Roy, whom he directed in Valerian and the city of a thousand planets. Director of The perfect assassin y Nikita presented Dogman in competition for the Golden Lion at the last edition of the Venice Film Festival (he didn’t win anything), quite a rarity because his film is nothing more than an action film with a character who cross-dresses and has several dozen dogs (hence the original title) that help him survive.
The protagonist is Caleb Landry Jones (3 ads for a crimewinner of the best actor award at Cannes 2021 for Nitram), who spends his time mostly in a wheelchair – his violent father shot him when he was a child – and surrounded by 60 dogs.
As I said, Besson returned to action movies, but with a small story.
That of a traumatized dog collector who takes on a queer identity, becoming a cash-strapped shooter and avenger of capitalist greed and domestic abuse.
Landry Jones is an independent film oddball, playing libertines (3 ads for one crime) or terrifying psychopaths (Twin Peaks: The Returnthe aforementioned Nitram). Douglas in Dogman is like a combination.
The first time we see Douglas Munrow, he is wearing a strapless dress, a somewhat disheveled blonde wig, and white makeup. He bleeds from his back and is arrested from the driver’s seat of a car.
The subsequent interrogation has to do with his “condition”, but also about a series of murders and home invasions that apparently would not be related. When interrogated by psychiatrist Evelyn (Jojo T. Gibbs), he is bound to a wheelchair. The curious thing is that both characters, the accused and the psychiatrist, have points in common, due to past traumas.
Nor is it that Besson is going to delve into the female character, which is a supporting character. So she will dedicate herself full time to Dogman.
There will be, from that moment on, a cataract of flashbacks, with Douglas as a child, mistreated by his father, a dog trainer, who abuses them, malnourishes them so that they are hungry and fight better, because that is how he makes a living. Besson based his script (in English) on an article he read about a French family who locked his son in a cage when he was five.
But, and yes, there is a major but, which is the exaggeration of everything (the fights; the deaths, the composition of the protagonist). Douglas takes care of his dogs, which he has adopted from different shelters, and considers them his children.
Caleb Landry Jones fights with the dogs to see who looks better on screen. With his braces, dressed as Edith Piaf, Marlene Dietrich or Marilyn Monroe, he stars in this macho carnage loaded with action, with a resolution of the type My poor angel.
Anyway, Besson has had better times.
Drama / Action France, 2023. 115′, SAM 16. Of: Luc Besson. Con: Caleb Landry Jones, Jojo T. Gibbs, Christopher Denham, Marisa Berenson. Salas: Hoyts Abasto and Unicenter, Cinépolis Recoleta and Pilar, Showcase Belgrano.