Review of Wiener-Dog (2016) by Nick W — 02 Sep 2016

If you like Todd Solondz, you should see Wiener-Dog, though I suppose that if you do, you probably already have (or plan to), but I just thought that it might be good to start by saying that it tastes very Solondzy, which is a certain sort of flavor which happens to be one which I like quite a bit.

This means nothing to anyone who hasn't seen his movies, and so, perhaps this review isn't helping very much. I'll try harder. I think I should probably say that if you haven't seen any, you should probably start with some of his other films, (like, perhaps, Welcome to the Dollhouse, Storytelling, Happiness, and/or Dark Horse) but also that it's totally not necessary-viewing to appreciate Wiener-Dog.

It's delicious on it's own. It's a pitch-dark comedy--a devastating tragicomic epic--with an episodic structure which feels a little like a book of loosely interwoven (though thematically tight) short stories.

It's full of Horrible-Hilarity, but it also contains some truly sad and touching moments; little bits of sort-of-warmness strewn throughout it's wonderfully-awful vignettes. And, speaking of books, I think that Todd Solondz is actually somewhat similar to George Saunders in regards to their characters.