Review: Good Boy (2025) — Horror from the Heart

★★★★½

“Rarf, rarf, rarf, raaaarrrrffff!”

All dog owners have been there. Whether it be the ass crack of dawn, a lazy-comfy afternoon on the couch or deep into a movie/show/book late at night, your furbuddy will suddenly lock eyes with vacant space and bring every super sense to full attention; sometimes letting out a machine gun belt of barks and sometimes remaining perfectly silent. We know that 99% of the time it’s a squirrel or UPS truck. But there’s that fraction to eternity of a second where we’re just as hair-raised — thoroughly convinced that they’ve found a danger eerily close and just as eerily beyond our detection.

Building a horror flick around this premise has been tried before, most notably in 1996’s Bad Moon. Human shenanigans have always taken precedence however, sliding our canine protagonist into shared screen time when their perspective is the more novel and interesting one. Enter Ben Leonberg, Kari Fischer, their Bruno S. of a naturally compelling doggy thespian Indy, and finally a wholehearted attempt at capturing that perspective.

At pet level the entire runtime, Good Boy does a wonderful job of balancing experiment with storytelling — giving us just enough peripheral plot to go on while immersing us in the fear, confusion, loyalty, courage and overwhelming sensory experience of a dog. What I love most about it though is the return to low-budge horror ingenuity; building tension and creepery largely through well-executed impressions that set our brains and pulses to work on what might be lurking in the darkness.

Indy’s journey to protect his good human Josh, the two moving into an obligatory scary house with plenty of family history and Mighty Booshian apparitions, unfolds at that odd/beautiful pace of a lean and mean slow-burn. For anyone concerned with Skinamarink 2.0 (which, incidentally, I also loved and will go to bat for), be not afraid in that regard. This is far from it, more akin to Soderbergh’s Presence yet mercifully without all the convolution.

We roll through narrative actually quite smoothly, tracking Josh’s battle with a mysterious lung disease and the ghostly happenings at the house. Placed in Indy’s paws though, faces are cut-off or distant and concealed — dialogue intentionally muffled and disorienting. Scenes brood with atmosphere and ambiguity, creating a strong vibe of impending evil and amplified vulnerability.

Not every sequence works, with shoestring limitations poking out on occasion. But my goodness what an achievement overall in dog performance, dog direction and editing. Indy, in addition to being inherently d’awwwwhhhh-inspiring, is remarkably expressive — giving Bing and Messi a run for their money in screen mastery. Leonberg and Fischer’s dedication and sheer DIY kool kidosity, patiently shooting with Indy over the course of three years, pays off brilliantly; assembled with razor-precise cuts by Curtis Roberts into a film that pulls us inside the peril even knowing so much of it included toys and treats behind the camera.

**SPOILERS AHOY**

Where this eventually leads is inevitably sad, yet not overbearing. I will spill (for the ease of all my fellow dog-lovers) that Indy is alive and physically well by the final frame. There is psychological turmoil however, in a borderline pet’s meditation on owner mortality. This includes the corpse of another dog, and a brief but nonetheless mournful final exchange with Josh. Josh’s periodic meanness, transformed by illness or spirit or both, is a little hard to watch as well. Too much for those among us who can catch a guy getting chainsawed up the butt without breaking a sweat and can’t get through 10 minutes of Hachi though? Not at all.

**SPOILERS DONE**

Definitely in my top horror picks for the year. Good Boy might not be everyone’s beloved Mr. Squeaky Moose, but damn it — it’s something new, something fun, something effective and something made from the heart. Big-time kudos.

Bonus points for retro-70s slow spooky zooms, and whatever that all drive-in channel Josh has playing on the old TV set is. Also for indie icon Larry Fessenden as weirdo, possibly phantasmic Grandpa. Because, of course.

Happy Halloween! ❤

Where to watch Good Boy.

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