Review of Dogtooth (2009) by Clo P — 25 Jan 2014

This Greek drama directed by Yorgos Lanthimos about a husband and wife who keep their children ignorant of the world outside their property well into adulthood seemed like unique one, but there was some resemblance with the 1972 Mexican film The Castle of Purity. It stars Christos Stergioglou, Michelle Valley, Aggeliki Papoulia, Mary Tsoni, and Christos Passalis. Dogtooth is Lanthimos' second feature film as solo director, and according to the positive review, most of the viewers liked it. Me, too! Don't ask me why, though... I just liked the craziness, the quirkiness, surprises...

The story of this family who lives in a large compound with a garden and swimming pool, a tall fence surrounding the property and the children who had never been on the other side of it, had its holes - plenty of them! But it was interesting to imagine for a moment how would children turn up if their parents have kept them unaware of the outside world, even of the existence of the telephone. They are taught different meanings for everyday words. For example, they are told that a "zombie" is "a small yellow flower," and that "sea" is a chair. The parents promise that each child will be ready to venture outside the compound once she or he has lost a dogtooth. Although the children are told they have a brother just on the other side of the barrier, he never appears, and later the others were told that he was killed by a cat. The film won the Prix Un Certain Regard at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 83rd Academy Awards. It was definitely fun watching it.

But, this is not for everybody! If you like the surrealism of Buñuel, the scalpel of Haneke, the underground horror of a thriller without the splatter, check this movie which was described as "the greatest Greek triumph of recent years".