The second instalment of Ben Lewis’s view on foreign film sees him perplexed by Dogtooth, a chilling drama from Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos, and winner of the Prix Un Certain Regard at Cannes.
After the screening of Regarde la Mer by François Ozon for my contemporary French cinema module, the general feeling was that of revulsion and invariably along the lines of what on earth have we just watched? (A toothbrush being rubbed in feces and then actually used by actress Sasha Hails, for example). People have walked out of cinemas for less shocking films.
Yet, upon reading about Dogtooth and watching the bizarre trailer, I felt I was up to the challenge of watching it – at the very least so I could report back to the readers of Exeposé. I thought that whatever happened, it ultimately would not be as shocking as Regarde la Mer. Apparently readers, Ozon has a long lost Greek brother.
So where to begin? To its credit, Dogtooth is one of the most memorable films I have ever seen, and an important film in Greek cinema being only the fifth Greek film to be nominated for an Oscar. It rivals Requiem for a Dream, Compliance and Regarde la Mer for impact, but of the three, it is probably most comparable to the unnerving and uncomfortable feeling experienced in viewing Compliance.
The film revolves around a Greek family who, barring the father, live an isolated life in a large countryside house. However, this family differ from others in that the parents have chosen the wildly popular and completely healthy option of bringing up their three late-teen, to early twenties children, completely oblivious to the real world.
Their methods include changing the meanings of words such as ‘phone’, so that it means a salt pot. The children are terrified to leave the grounds of their house, and they believe that the cat is the most ferocious and deadly animal in the animal kingdom due to the laughable act and story concocted by their father. This example provokes one of the many memorable scenes of the film, in which the father teaches his children to defend themselves from the cat, by getting all three children and his wife on all fours, and to bark manically like dogs.
The success of the parents in keeping their children effectively ignorant and afraid of the world is incredibly chilling, and it makes for even more uncomfortable viewing when we realise this fictional portrayal has real-life similarities, such as with the case of Josef Fritzl and the imprisonment of his daughter in his house for over twenty years. Thus we can’t reassure ourselves that this film is just crazy art-house cinema.
If this wasn’t memorable enough, there are also scenes where the father smashes a VCR recorder around the head of his female security guard for bringing traces of the outside world into the house (two movies including one of the Rocky series), as well as the elder daughter performing an eerily accurate rendition of a dance from Flashdance.
This subsequently leads to her smashing out her ‘dogtooth’ with a dumbbell. Her reasoning? The parents tell the children over dinner one night that they will only be ready to leave the house when their dogtooth has fallen out.
There are definitely allegorical references to authoritarian power and oppression. The namelessness of the children (promoting conformity), their brainwashing and vulnerability bear many resemblances to the lives of citizens in former extreme right and left-wing nations. The son killing an innocent cat may be seen as a metaphor for what the parents have done to the children.
They clearly would not function in the real world, or would at the very least, need a month’s slot on the Jeremy Kyle show.
Ultimately, the film is probably more for the film buff or individual that wants to claim to have seen the weirdest movie ever – and that’s without me revealing the most repulsive aspect of the movie, which is the catalyst for the demise of the father’s control. I will leave that for you to discover for yourselves.
Regardless, the fact that I am still questioning what exactly I witnessed means that the film has at least been original. I’m just glad that there hasn’t been a co-production between François Ozon, Darren Aronofsky (Requiem for a Dream) and Giorgos Lanthimos (Dogtooth). I don’t think the world, or Jeremy Kyle, is ready for that just yet.
3/5
Have you seen Dogtooth, or anything quite as bizarre? Let us know your favourite grotesque cinematic moments via Facebook, Twitter, or by commenting below.
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