Making its debut at this month's IFFR, the award winning The Dog Who Wouldn't Be Quiet (El Perro Que No Calla) follows Sebastian (Daniel Katz) as he tries to placate his neighbours and workplace when his dog, suffering from immense loneliness, creates a noise issue by crying out in his absence. Choosing to completely change his way of life, we follow Sebastian as he navigates his way through and acclimatises to a number of unexpected personal and societal twists and turns.
Directed and co-written by Argentinian director Ana Katz, this monochrome social-realist fantasy depicts key moments in the life of Sebastian (Daniel Katz), a graphic designer and owner of an 8 year old dog who can't bear to be without him, to the point where he sobs until he returns. Sebastian is a shy, caring man who only wants the best for his pet and everyone around him, and is so unshackled to his own sense of emotional wellbeing that he's willing to change his life to keep others happy, including moving to a remote farm where he can live with his dog in peace. But when tragedy strikes and his life is up-ended once more, he finds himself at a loss, unsure of what direction his life will take and how much control he has in it.
Packing a lot of this man's life into its 73 minutes runtime, it's hard to gauge how much time passes on screen - but given the number of different hairstyles Sebastian dons, at least 5 years - as he drifts from job to job, caring for sick people and helping distribute food with a grocer's co-operative. Jumping between what appear to be random times in his life, it's a beautiful, peaceful film and Sebastian is a character that, even through inaction, seems all too relatable. He's an emotionally guarded but altogether "good" person, holding onto the frustrations he feels as life continually serves him another curveball. This may be his first screen credit, but it's a terrific, insulated performance from Daniel Katz, who's in almost every frame of the film. Even when he's not saying much (or even anything) in a scene, there's a deep sadness and emotional warmth in his eyes that speaks volumes.
Despite the hard to fully pin down synopsis I've offered, it's not all doom and gloom in Sebastian's life. In amongst the tragedies and setbacks that befall him, there's surprising moments of well-observed comedy, such as Sebastian's neighbours all arriving one by one at his house to complain about the noise from his dog, all squeezed into a small space and all carrying umbrellas, or the two way dancefloor seduction Sebastian shares with a young woman (Julieta Zylberberg) and the well placed jump forward in time that reveals the outcome of their encounter. Under Katz's direction, it's easy to become fully immersed in Sebastian's world, even when the story takes an unexpected sci-fi turn. I say sci-fi, but after the 2020 we've just had, seeing characters forced to don oversized face coverings and confirm to a set of strict rules - in this case the need to stay under a height of 4 foot - seems all too plausible. Still, it's another turn you don't see coming, partially illustrated by one of the moments of animation that are peppered throughout.
A film about facing life's many unexpected, often suffocating moments of rigour head on, The Dog Who Wouldn't be Quiet continually shifts from the path you think it's on, giving lovely, sweet scenes of this average man's life that feel all too relatable, even when pushed into the realm of satirical sci-fi. A quiet, emotional, meditative experience. Enjoy.
In cinemas from Friday 24th March is Nicolas Pesce's beautiful and disturbing horror, The Eyes of My Mother.
"Everything we see passes through here" says a mother to her young daughter as they dissect a cows eyeball at the start of this film. A surgeon in her home country of Portugal, she is now living in small town America with her husband and daughter, Francisca. When a seemingly kind and well mannered stranger called Charlie approaches the house, this film shows the level of tension that can be induced by being both eerily still and sinister at the same time. Presented in black and white, The Eyes of My Mother is a startlingly atmospheric film that is both grisly and gorgeous, and one that is deeply unsettling in its ability to shock whilst showing you very little. By stripping the film of a normal colour palette, your brain is required to fill in the blanks and left to imagine what colours are being cleaned off the kitchen floor. And that is among the film's greatest strengths; the ability to play on the audience's fear of the unknown, refusing to conform to traditional horror expectations. Just as you think a character is about to see their end, the film cuts away to the aftermath. It also plays on some basic human fears, such as eye trauma (especially eye trauma) and the danger of picking up a stranger in your car. Add to that the perceived mundanity of Francisca's life as she cares for her father, and there are many factors that the audience may find disconcertingly familiar.
Separated into chapters (I. Mother. II. Father III. Family) that see Francisca at different times of her life, there are prolonged periods of silence interspersed with distant hums in the background, as if someone is playing music in a room at the end of a long, dark corridor. The passage of time is fluid and able to jump forward, leaving you to ponder the consequences that have befallen some of the less fortunate characters. Often drenched in darkness both figuratively and literally, the extent of the trauma Francisca is able to inflict is slowly revealed and is utterly horrific in nature, from a place that will linger in the mind of the audience for a long time. As played by Kika Magalhaes, Francisca appears to be a quiet, pure woman, hiding the most awful of her deeds in the barn and the life she lives behind a shroud of innocence. It's a fantastic performance of a complex character, reserved with the capability of shocking us through the simplest of actions.
With photography and some tonal elements that recall the work of Jonathan Glazer and directed with tremendous skill by first timer Nicolas Pesce, The Eyes of My Mother is a genuinely terrifying film with startling visuals of retina pervading power that travel deep into the darkest recesses of the soul.
