How do you convey a horror story through the lens of someone who isn’t human? Who doesn’t think like you or me?

Ben Leonberg explores this idea through his new movie “Good Boy,” which came out Oct. 3. This movie portrays the story of a dog, Indy, and his owner, Todd, and their experiences with a supernatural entity through the lens of Indy’s eyes. 

The film centers around Indy, only using Todd as a side character with small snippets of dialogue to help the audience piece together the plot. Todd is so insignificant; you almost never see his face. The movie truly is centered around Indy and his inquisitive nature with his haunted surroundings. 

The film uses many close-up shots of Indy to direct the viewers’ attention to him, and focuses on his features and body language to indicate what he is possibly thinking and feeling during the scene. As a dog lover, I was always sad and scared for Indy, because the camera always picked up such intricate details about the dog; I felt like I could feel what he did. 

Like any good horror movie, there are a couple of jump scares. What little acting the human characters there were was truly horrific, as you could see the way the entity took control of their bodies, banging their head against doors, coughing up blood and out of body experiences.

The best thing about this film is that Indy the dog is not even an actor; he is Leonberg’s pet. At the end of the film, there is a short message from the director himself, explaining the project. In it, he says that Indy did not even know they were filming the entire time. They worked around Indy’s schedule, which meant they would only film for about 1-3 hours most days. It took over three years for the film to be made because of the way they filmed around Indy. 

In an interview with Colin McCormack from SAGindie, Leonberg said: “He’s so serious and has these very thoughtful-looking eyes. Objective shots of that, combined with a subjective point of view, we could make a whole film just with that.” And that he did. 

While watching the film, I thought this was a professional acting dog because of the intense looks Indy was giving. I would have never guessed that he was the director’s pet. 

If you are interested in watching “Good Boy,” you can see it in select theaters until the end of October depending on your location. To find out more about this movie and screen times go to the website.

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