Dogtooth

Inscrutable was the first word that came to mind after watching Dogtooth. As the closing credits rolled, I sat there wondering what I had just witnessed, similar to the first time I saw David Lynch’s Eraserhead.

Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos‘ conundrum of a film is a hard one to pin down.

Dogtooth poses a lot of questions and answers almost none. Lanthimos and co-writer Efthymis Filippou leave it up to you to parse everything you’ve watched and decide what it all means.

Why are the parents keeping their almost-grown children isolated — essentially captive — from the world beyond their small rural compound? Why are they teaching them alternative meanings to words of things outside their compound (e.g., sea: a leather armchair with wooden arms; motorway: a very strong wind; excursion: a very resistant metal used to construct floors)? Why is the son allowed conjugal visits, but the daughters aren’t?

Your list of questions grows and grows.

Lanthimos creates a tense atmosphere throughout the film by using unconventional camera angles that obscure parts of the characters’ faces or actions. The “children” (played by Angeliki Papoulia, Mary Tsoni, and Christos Passalis) speak in an awkward cadence, like children in a school play. The film also includes a mix of absurdist humor, sudden violence, and uncomfortable voyeurism.

The parents (Christos Stergioglou and Michelle Valley) subject their children to strange and obscure training exercises to prepare them for the outside world. For example, they make the children compete blindfolded to find their mother in the backyard and go to great lengths to convince them that a small cat is a dangerous animal that must be killed. All the while, the outside world appears to be completely normal, despite the odd behavior of the family.

Dogtooth is the sort of movie that film club is meant for. You may not have the answers, but you benefit from discussing various interpretations with others in the group.