3 out of 5

Directed by: Kornél Mundruczó

So this is, like, a well done B-movie?  I think your impression of White God will depend on how seriously you take, and how much it changes your opinion depending on how seriously you think the filmmakers intended it to be taken.  The flick is sort of like a mix of Homeward Bound and Cujo, with elements of a slave rebellion worked in – which the Ebert review likens to Spartacus, so, sure – and I think if it had decidedly thrown its hat into the ring of one genre over another, it could’ve been a pretty spectacular flick (either really visceral or really bad in a good way), but the half-stepping makes it more of a curiosity than anything.

We open on a slow-mo shot of Lili (Zsófia Psotta) pedaling through abandoned streets and bridges, which our Walking Dead training has alerted us to be on the watch for something zombie-esque.  And soon enough there’s a loud rumble… and a wave of dogs surges down the road toward Lili.

On the one hand, if you’re going into this blind (the posters have this shot on them, so it’s a little tough, but let’s suppose), it’s a pretty awesome shot.  On the other hand, shock aside, it can be a little underwhelming – Lili’s reaction doesn’t quite seem to give us any sense of threat or joy or whatever.  It’s just happening.  And I don’t quite put that on the actress, as the iffy tone exists throughout the whole flick, and otherwise, she’s quite good in a role that requires a kidly balance of maturity and immaturity due to being a kid having to raise themselves.  We flash back to a morning when Lil’s mum and step-dad are leaving her with her father while they do some away-from-home business things.  Dad’s a tough git, and does not want Lili’s dog Hagen in his apartment, and circumstances lead to him kicking the dog out of their car on a random street.  From here on out the film splits – following Hagen’s trials and tribulations trying to get back home, which has him shacking up with street dogs then getting shanghaied for the dog-fighting route and then impounded, and following Lili’s interactions with her father, as they learn to love each other and blah blah.  It’s pretty heavy-handed.  There’s clear “poignant” dialogue and the turning point when Lili’s father suddenly “gets” it is handled with hammered plotting.  But the more open-ended dog bits are amusing, with an amazing dog actor conveying ridiculously human responses to various things, and the editing together of scenes effectively telling a story without any human narration.

At this point the film isn’t very good, but it’s not bad, and them dogs keep it pleasant.  And then… the dogs fight back.  These scenes are so ridiculous – and so so B-movie glorious – that you can’t help but wish director / writer Mundruczó had just pushed this element to the extreme, blood and guts and animal revenge.  Instead, it’s a lot of running around and screaming.  The blocking and editing – and the music! – is still well done, and just the gist of it is a good time, but again, buried underneath the heavy-handedness of each element is some better realized version of it, which could probably have been focused on for a tighter sense of story.  As is, the link between Lili and Hagen grows more and more tenuous, which makes the ending rather silly as well, but that’s also a result of White God thinking it’s a much deeper movie than it is.  Because, really, this is “treat animals bad and you’ll get killed” horror basics moralizing, with some family stuff tossed in there to make it a movie.

Feel free to ignore that, though, and just watch it for the dog bits.