Based on Dav Pilkey’s beloved comic book series, Dreamworks Animation’s “Dog Man,” released on Jan. 31, brings the horrific story of a half-man, half-dog cop to the silver screen with versatile camera work, hilarious bits, horrific editing and a mediocre story.
“Dog Man” follows the titular character, voiced by the film’s director Peter Hastings, as he relentlessly confronts the rotten Petey the Cat, voiced by Pete Davidson. In their tussles, the two enemies become united when Petey Jr., a clone of Petey the Cat, is put into harm’s way.
The narrative of “Dog Man” often treads into sentimental and heart-wrenching territory, but it never sticks the landing. Dog Man must confront his new life after the horrific accident that gave him the body of a man with the head of a dog; meanwhile, Petey the Cat is coping with the childhood trauma of his father leaving him. Both points are touched on briefly before the film cuts to the next visual gag or the b-plot. Hastings never gives audiences time to sit with the characters, which hinders the film from having an emotional flair that viewers may come to expect from a Dreamworks Animation film.
This brevity of shots throughout the runtime consistently ruins the experience. While it works for some action sequences, it begins to feel gimmicky — as if the story of Dog Man should have been told through a series of short films instead.
Releasing “Dog Man” as a short film collection could have possibly helped with many of the drab narrative beats. Expectations are never subverted within the film. The plot point of Flippy, an evil fish voiced by Ricky Gervais, is introduced at the beginning of the film, mentioned once in the second act and finally utilized in the third — an obvious employment of Checkhov’s gun. The enemies-to-allies plot also feels familiar and becomes evident when Flippy is first introduced.
Although the story is familiar and the constant jump cuts never give the audience room to breathe — as Hastings desperately tries to keep the attention of a younger audience — “Dog Man” has some phenomenal animation and camera work. Animated in the popular ‘3-D-but-it-feels-2-D’ animation style, “Dog Man” plays out through a fixed camera lens — often giving viewers the sense they are reading Pilkey’s original series. However, the visual flair is upped through the consistent use of arc shots highlighting the depth of the city and characters.
“Dog Man” also uses humor to appeal to older and younger audiences. With tons of meta jokes and visual gags, the film is sure to put a smile on any viewer’s face. That being said, Dreamworks Animation needs to make a sequel to “Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie,” another film based on the work of Pilkey, and utilize some of the technical aspects of “Dog Man.”
