The South African film “Dog” is a story of how the treatment of creatures, such as a dog, can create punishment in the future. The film starts out with light, happy music as the main character raises the flag over the houses property. The director goes onto show a regular day of work for the workers as the boy cuts string off of the flagpole to make a collar for the dog. The director makes sure the audience realize that the boy shouldn’t be cutting string from the flagpole due to the shot-reverse-shot of the boy looking at the workers and the workers fixing up the house for the day. Later, the boss of the boy, and the rest of the workers, sees the boy has a dog for himself. So, to make an example, the boss makes the boy put the puppy in a bag and the boss kicks the puppy in the bag. The boss makes the boy take the dog out of the bag so then the dog will see the boy and feel betrayed and hate him.

Years later, the boy is grown into a man. The man raises a new flag as the boss, older now and now has not as good health, comes out to his porch and takes his heart medication. The director shows that the boss now is the owner of the dog. The boss, man and dog go out to the field far from the house and start to work on replacing a wooden stake in the ground. As the man slams the mallet down onto the new wooden stake, the boss is unimpressed. The boss starts working hard on getting the stake into the ground but then falls and clenches onto his chest as he is having a heart attack. Due to the dog growing hatred for the man since he thinks he kicked him all of those years ago, the dog protects the boss from the man. To get his heart medication from the man, the boss tells the man to shoot the dog, resulting in killing a dog that misunderstood the world and what really happened during his life.

What works in this story is how the director shows tension (when the man was trying to give his boss his heart medication) and the conflict between the dog and man. Once, they were best friends, but through treachery and lies, they were divided by a force (the boss) that controlled them.

1. How are the characters introduced? Through the course of the movie, how do their actions define who they are?

First, the monster is portrayed to be a menacing entity until the “kid” screams and results in the monster being scared and hurting himself with many items around the room. Further, the scene is made to be a monster going to scare a kid but it is revealed it is just a simulation and there are people being taught how to safely and affectively scare kids.

1. How is the setting portrayed? What is the sense of space in the movie—what do you see or not see in the world that these characters inhabit?

The setting is portrayed as first a normal kids bedroom as he goes to bed, but then it is revealed as the monster messes up, it is a simulation room for practicing scaring.

1. What types of shots do you see in the film? How do the filmmakers use photography to set a tone and style?

One shot that really stood out was the wide shot of the monster performing the scaring while he was injuring himself for comedic affect. A lot of the time, many comedies will use full/wide shots for comedic affect so the frame can catch the actors freakout.

1. What is the pace and style of the editing? Describe two cuts in the movie: between what shots do they occur and at what points in the story? In what ways do any edits add meaning to the shots or help the flow of scenes?

During the first portion of the scene, it is very slowly paced, building tension, such as when the monster slowly rises from under the bed. Later in the scene, there are quick cuts because of the monster messing up and creating laughs for the audience.

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