Tacoma Arts in Review: "Dogtooth" at the Grand Cinema

A lesson on the dangers insularity and misinformation, “Dogtooth” is an uncomfortable exploration of a father’s efforts to maintain dictatorial control over his family. “Dogtooth” depicts the lives of a family whose interactions with the outside world are severely mediated by the only family member who ventures beyond the gates of their estate – the father (played by Christos Stergioglou). Such extreme isolation leads to a bizarre family life, to say the least.

Although they are easily in their twenties, the family’s three children display the kind of pettiness and effortless brutality that only children can. The unusually violent youngest daughter (Mary Tsoni), the son (Hristos Passalis), and the oldest daughter (Aggeliki Papoulia) amuse themselves with twisted games of “endurance,” and compete for their parent’s love – and stickers – by answering academic questions. The implications of the father’s control over his wife and children become increasingly discomfiting as it the film develops, showing that the father exerts the same level of utter control over his family as he does to the family dog. The children will be free to leave their enclosure, their parents tell them, once they have properly matured which will be evidenced when their “dogtooth” falls out. The parents maintain that until this (fictional) event occurs venturing into the outside world is far too dangerous.

From the first it is clear that this family’s understanding of their world is built on misinformation. Unfamiliar (and potentially subversive) outside words like “sea” are stripped of their meaning and recontextualized into the family’s known world. For example: “sea” is redefined as a sort of large comfortable armchair, and “phone” becomes synonymous with saltshaker.

In contrast to the intimate and violent home life, the film imbues the world outside the enclosure with a sense of sterility and almost post-apocalyptic emptiness that makes the parent’s claim seem absurd, yet strangely accurate. The family’s only contact with the outside world is through Christina, a security guard at the father’s factory, who is brought in weekly to ‘service’ the son. No longer satisfied by this role, Christina subtly corrupts “the eldest,” upsetting an already fragile familial balance and introducing elements of the outside world that cannot be explained away.

In spite of its twisted moments of humor, the film is predominantly psychological horror woven through with elements of dark satire, maintaining a level of sinister unease throughout. Released in Greece in late 2009, the biting commentary on the Greek political situation from writer/director Giorgos Lanthimos is subtle but undeniable. A sense of menace pervades the film, coloring every interaction, every sterile shot of domesticity, as something vaguely foreign. “Dogtooth” unravels at a somewhat laconic rate: at moments, it seems suspended outside of our normal understanding of temporality. Despite, or perhaps because of this, it is peculiarly captivating, taking an unexpected hold that persists long after you’ve left the theatre.

Review by Lindsey Flatt

“Dogtooth” plays at the Grand Cinema through April 7. www.grandcinema.com”:http://www.grandcinema.com/movie.php?id=496
Mon/Tues, April 4/5: (1:55), (4:05)
Wed/Thurs, April 6/7: 8:30