Tuesday, January 26, 2010

From the Roku: A Boy and His Dog (1976)



Strange double feature last night. I have to admit that I put this on just to kill some time. What I was rewarded with was a deeply weird movie, set in the arid, radioactive wastelands of Phoenix (or Tucson) in the year 2024. It apparently comes from a 1969 prize-winning book by Harlan Ellison. What I found interesting was Don Johnson was in it, costarring with a telepathic dog, I liked the alternate history timeline that apparently Ellison created, and the idea of a society living underground that tries to recreate some sort of 1950's homogeny is an interesting idea. Why that underground society wear's clown/mime makeup is anyone's guess. Being the 70's it is defnitely sort of creepy, and definitely strange. There's no reason given for why the dog is telepathic, at least none that I could find. Its an interesting curio. But the misogyny is really offputting. Part of the dog's job is not only help Don Johnson find food but also find women. Women to rape. Ellison himself says the message wasn't what he meant to put out, but it seems pretty implicit.

So yeah, an interesting enough trifle, maybe to catch by accident on a Sunday afternoon and go, "Hey Don Johnson and a talking dog!" But thats really about it.

Truth in advertising, really the poster, this time, tells you an awful lot about what you need to know about this one:

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