On the edge of the Gobi desert in China, a patrol team is clearing the streets of stray dogs as the country is preparing for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. There is, however, one dog that refuses to be removed.
Black Dog, a new film from China, tells the story of a stray greyhound whose dogged spirit to stay free leads to an emotional bond with a member of the dog patrol team. Directed by Guan Hu, the Chinese film won the top prize at this year’s Cannes film festival’s Un Certain Regard section for fresh voices in world cinema.
The decision of the Un Certain Regard jury, headed by celebrated Canadian director Xavier Dolan, to honour Black Dog reflects a year during which some of the finest films from around the world have centred on the endearing relationship between human beings and their best friend.
In fact, Cannes had two films with a dog in the lead. Besides Black Dog, a French film titled Dog on Trial turned heads for its curious subject of a young Parisian lawyer defending a dog charged with repeat offences from capital punishment.
The pandemic and current tensions across the world are attributed to the return of the dogs to the side of humans, reflected in the movies that will start hitting the screen in the coming months. The presence of many powerful dog movies this year shows the return of canines after a long cat invasion of cinema.
A Great Dane, called Bing in real life, stole the show at the Telluride Film Festival in the United States in September. The Friend, starring Naomi Watts, tells the poignant story of a writer surviving the suicide of a fellow writer (played by Bill Murray) with the help of his dog Apollo, whom she inherits. The film also wowed audiences at the Toronto International Film Festival for its focus on loss and grief and overcoming tragedy through sharing, with a dog.
Another dog film this year, Seeking Haven for Mr Rambo, premiered at the Venice festival. Set in Cairo, Egypt, the film shows the determination of a 30-year-old man to find a safe place for his dog, Rambo, who rescues him from a violent physical assault by another man. “For years, I have envisioned a blurry image—a young man alone on a dark, quiet sidewalk at night, hugging his dog amid the cold,” says the film’s director Khaled Mansour.
The year of the dog on screen follows a long era of domination of cat films, from Garfield to Cats & Dogs and Felix the Cat to A Street Cat Named Bob. Some festivals today even honour top performances by dogs, like the Palme Dog in Cannes.
Two years ago, Hong Kong filmmaker Elizabeth Lo, whose sophomore documentary Mistress Dispeller, about the Chinese love industry’s solution to crowded marriages, premiered in Venice this year, went to Istanbul, Turkey, to film its stray dogs. Stray, Elizabeth’s debut film, portrayed Istanbul’s street dog culture.
“Cities without stray dogs are inhumane,” says Elizabeth. “I discovered Turkey had this incredible relationship with stray dogs where, for the last 100 years, the state has tried to get rid of the dogs from the streets, but because people have this deep attachment to the street dog culture, they protested against the government’s culling attempts,” she says.