Good Boy (2025) Review

Indy won "Best Performance in a Horror or Thriller" at the 9th Annual Astra Film Awards for his role in the 2025 film Good Boy.

Normally, horror movies struggle with dogs because, whilst well trained, the dog is clearly proud of how well it is behaving and is very happy to be doing its tricks. The DoP has to cut the tail out of the scene. See The Babadook.

The first scene is unsettling: a man's blood drips on his phone as Indy watches and sniffs him. His sister arrives and calls an ambulance. Indy stares at the camera.

We get incredibly cute footage of puppy Indy growing with his owner. It's remarkable having Indy as the focus of the camera work. He's on screen so much he is less 'directed' than a typical dog; he looks at the camera, off in random directions. Dog behaviour. Much of the camera work is also head height for Indy rather than the humans, which gives a very different experience.

Given a stay command, Indy still explores a little whilst his owner's not looking. We get some disturbing rear shots and a guy in camouflage with a bow turns up, says hi to the dog. His creepy voice, bush costume, bow, and the fact he's booby-trapped the woods come across as someone pretty far from normal, but perhaps this is a Eurocentric view.

We do get some stress yawns from Indy, but the actor is good at disengaging when we see them. The owner tells Indy off for whining when the generator comes on. Too much of that and I'm going to be cheering the monsters on. He does share popcorn in a cute way that no dog owner would admit to doing, so I'll reset his strikes to 0.

Even though he's sick, he pushes Indy away and says "get the fuck out of here". I'm calling that strikes 1 and 2. (It is a little hard to root for a "Todd".) He yells at Indy again in the doctor's office as they turn him down for experimental treatment. Strike 3. (How many strikes in baseball? If anyone has watched a game, please tell me.)

There is a mysterious second dog in a red bandana in the house after Todd leaves. Indy follows it curiously. The dog's been seen once before in Indy's dream.

Todd spends some time slamming his head into the cellar door. He opens the door, but does not go through. His kitchen is full of empty bottles of wine, and his TV shows old tapes.

Indy gets some pretty scary visions of the grandfather bleeding from his mouth and screaming. The bandana dog, and flickering lights and shadows. More and more Indy is seeing shadow people, who seem to be made of clay. He sits in the doorway, watching; a shadow goes past so he investigates. His tail a little too happy for the situation. More likely he'd have barked. An alert bark. He's a very quiet dog, other than some occasional whining.

The whistles Todd uses sound from the basement, light flickers on and off, and a shadow rushes to him. Indy wakes suddenly. It was a dream. He's grabbed and dragged under the bed. It's Todd, who's fallen, or hiding, it's unclear. A shadow hand strokes Indy, and suddenly Todd stands and moves away. He collapses and the door shuts, keeping him out. Indy barks. The cameraman tries to use the bed to hide his wagging tail. His ears are much too perky for the situation.

Indy parkours the roof to the ground and runs into the night barking. He's absolutely tearing through the forest looking for something. He stops at a light and looks behind, knowing there is something there. He's trapped by the crazy hunter's traps, trapped as the shadow approaches.

Luckily it's Todd and it is suddenly daytime. He gets chained up in the yard as Todd wanders into the forest barefoot. Indy's left out in the rain. He has a kennel, but stands on top of it, looking up at the window where we can hear Todd cough. In the dark, eyes can be seen. Then a fox. Maybe they were the same.

A shadow creature appears behind Indy. With clever use of reflections, it seems like blood splatters on the window, but it is just Todd coughing blood into the sink. Indy manages to get into his kennel, away from the shadow man. The shadow man's hand comes up from the dark and Indy bolts, but is pulled back and back into the kennel, until Indy changes tack and charges the kennel, rolling it over and breaking the poorly affixed chain.

Free, he must go past the hiding shadow man to find a way into the house. To Todd. Todd hugs him, but is then dragged away by the dog chain after seeing himself in the bed bleeding. Indy follows, smashing through a window and following into the vast basement. The inky blackness takes over Todd. He tells Indy he's a good dog, but he can't be saved.

Indy sits, facing the hole Todd disappeared into as the sun slowly rises. Todd's body is dead in bed. The red-bandana dog's body is at the bottom of the stairs. Todd's sister finds him. After a long wait, Indy runs up the stairs to her.

The film works because Indy does an amazing job and the cinematography is great. The way they shoot the angles and frame the dog is excellent. Indy is an uncertain animal, not a wolf, not a guard dog, but a pet who's faced with the unknown. The story would fall flat with a human main character, as it is quite slow and very contained, but the creepy creature and uncertainty work really well with a dog.

The idea the dog may die adds a level of horror that just doesn't exist when the victims are human. It's obviously a parallel to cancer, but it doesn't quite work as a metaphor. It's both too violent and too external. I think we needed more of it looming around Todd rather than seeming to be Indy's protagonist.

Merlin was less enthused than I was by all the focus Indy got. There was a pretty regular undercurrent of growling and screen-watching that is very rare from him. After a while he just fell asleep on top of my foot.