This was the final of the MIFF “classic” films I was seeing this year and after having seen the 11:30pm session the night before, I almost passed on this 11am session since I had already seen this film previous. “Barking Dogs Never Bite” is South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-Ho’s debut feature and it is such a great film that I was glad I decided to go to the screening in the end. In fact, I liked it so much, I enjoyed it more than the first time I saw it.
The film is about a guy, Yun-Ju, who lives in a large apartment block who has studied to become a professor, but due to the limited number of opportunities, he realizes that he will have to bribe a dean to secure a position. The only problem is he has no money. He also has to deal with his overly demanding pregnant wife who clearly wears the pants in the relationship. One day while stressing about his future, he hears a dog barking non-stop. The constant yapping gets into his head, until he cracks and goes looking for the mutt, which he finds. Trying to make sure that the dog will stay quiet (the dog has stopped barking since he has been found) is harder than it looks, and after not being able to bring himself to throw the dog from the building’s roof, he instead heads down to the basement where he locks the dog in an unused cupboard. He has succeeded, he has found silence.
Meanwhile, a young office worker Hyeon-Nam (the always great Bae Doo-Na) dreams of becoming famous after witnessing on television a young bank worker fighting off thieves. Seeing the fame that girl achieved from the incident, she decides she wants the same for herself. Back at the apartment block, the barking has started again, and after Yun-Ju runs outside to see where it is coming from, he immediately spots the culprit. He also realizes his mistake as he passes a “lost dog” poster with a picture of the first dog he trapped downstairs. At the bottom of the poster it states “Can’t bark due to a throat operation”. He rushes to where he put the dog but is unfortunately too late – the dog has perished. Still no time for regrets, he still has to catch the right dog, which in hilarious circumstances he does and this time he is brave enough to throw the poor dog from the roof to its death. However this time there is a witness to his crime. Amazingly Hyeon-Nam saw Yun-Ju throw the dog, and realizing this is her chance to become famous, sets off after him. A side-splitting chase scene follows, but ultimately Yun-Ju gets away, but when he gets home he is shocked to discover that his wife has just bought a dog for a pet.
The thing that is so evident while watching “Barking Dogs Never Bite” is that Bong Joon-Ho was a master of his craft right from the start. This is a magnificently directed film. His camerawork is amazing and all of his choices just seem to work. For example, the times when he does choose to use slow-motion, it works to great comedic effect. That is what this film is, by the way, a fantastic black comedy. That is another part of its genius, is that the tone of this film is just spot on. It has some quite strange things in it, but it is forever funny. Although there is comedy in “The Host”, he hasn’t really tackled another comedy since “Barking Dogs Never Bite” which is a shame because he certainly understands it (though what he has since given us has been brilliant, so I cannot complain). All of the performances are pitch-perfect (which is a hard thing to achieve in a film like this) and the dogs themselves are great. Beware if you are a dog lover because you may have a hard time with this film, but there is a disclaimer at the start of the film assuring us that “no dogs were harmed in the making of this film”.
4 Stars.
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