Worth: $16.50
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Julian Garner, Felicity Price, Asha Boswarva, Michael Monk
Intro:
… one of the most exciting local productions of the year.
There’s nothing wrong with a little bit of playtime to get you through the day; what is life without well-measured vice, to quote The Correspondents? But, when that fantasy becomes a hazard in one’s own life, it’s an entirely different matter; a matter that stockbroker Richard (Julian Garner), the protagonist of Aussie filmmaker Dane McCusker’s feature debut, wrestles with in one of the most exciting local productions of the year.
While the plot deals in matters of dom-sub dynamics, specifically financial domination or findom, The Big Dog doesn’t explore the subversive wholesomeness of the practice like Secretary or Sanctuary, nor does it dip into the reality-bending of Use Me. Instead, this to-the-point 80-minute feature deals with it at the emotional extreme, both high and low. It works similarly to Shiva Baby or even Butt Boy, with its premise fit for a comedy, but the presentation of an intense thriller.
Domestic arguments between Richard and his wife (Felicity Price), while screwball in their specifics, are shown as nerve-gouging battles set to a metronome. The play sessions between Richard and ‘Princess Paige’ (Asha Boswarva), right from the start, reveal a wealth of understanding of how the internet refracts and warps our perceptions and boundaries, gradually going from cheeky fun to psychological warfare. All while Richard’s son Sam (Michael Monk) continues to fall down the incel rabbit hole.
As raucously funny as this film can be with its well-pitched dialogue and performances, it’s with the underlying theme behind all the absurdity that it makes the biggest impact. A theme that, at the mere mention of it, has a habit of making some men tense up until they turn their coinpurse into a diamond: Toxic masculinity; the doctrine that men are dominant and in control. Always. No vulnerability, no defining one’s own happiness; just ‘be a man about it’. Between Richard and Sam, the film deals candidly in both the implosive and explosive ends that this line of thinking can lead to – the retreats into fantasy, into abdication of responsibility, because it’s too much to face how impossible ideals only serve to make people hate themselves for failing to reach them. Hiding genuine pain and imposed inadequacy, only realising that they can open up after they’ve already driven away anyone who might’ve listened. Self-destruction wearing an inflatable muscle suit.
The Big Dog lunges right at highly touchy subjects and sinks its fangs in deep, balancing suspense and sly humour in a way that lets the ridiculousness of the plot and its depressing underpinnings complement and energise each other. Beyond its advocation for men to be open and honest about their shit before it hits the fan, the film craft and storytelling shows Dane McCusker as a bristling talent worth keeping an eye on. A genuine triumph for the Australian film scene, up there with Talk to Me and Godless: The Eastfield Exorcism.
