UA lonely boy, marked by life, decides to take revenge on the world using his beloved pack of dogs. It’s the plot of Dogmandirected by Luc Besson in 2023 and played by the excellent Caleb Landry Jones. The horror fairy tale, presented in competition at the 2023 Venice Film Festivalpremieres tonight at 9.20pm on Rai 3.
Dogman by Luc Besson: plot of the film released in 2023 on Rai 3 tonight 28 October
Doug (Caleb Landry Jones) is a young man with a marked life from childhood by pain and violence. Victim of his stepfather’s abuse, he grows up alone, finding comfort only in the company of his dogsthe only beings capable of offering him love and protection. As an adult, the weight of trauma pushes him to completely isolate himself from the world: he thus takes refuge in an abandoned school on the edge of the city where he lives together with his pack, his only reason for living.
To survive, Doug performs as a drag queen at night and, in the artificial lights of the stage, he finds a new form of freedom that reality denies him. However, its existence remains marked by a past that never stops haunting him: childhood memories resurface like shadows and the resentment towards the violence suffered turns into a need for personal revenge.
Doug thus trains his dogs – trained with devotion and intelligence – to attack those who exercise violence or crueltyespecially aggressive or authoritarian men, like the stepfather who had traumatized him. But as the crimes pile up, Doug becomes a dangerous figure in the eyes of the authorities and when the police discover his refuge they intervene to capture him and put an end to his “personal crusade” against the world.
Caleb Landry Jones in a scene from “Dogman”. (Lucky Red)
An excessive but fascinating dark fairy tale
Directed by Luc Besson, Dogman it is perhaps the most intimate and painful film by the French filmmaker: a story about marginalization and the desperate search for love in a world that punishes diversity. Far from the spectacular nature of his action cinema, the director adopts a more human and spiritual gazewhile maintaining his taste for a theatrical and visually refined staging. Doug’s universe, populated by dogs and disguises, thus becomes ua metaphor for survival and a tragic fairy tale that mixes cruelty and tenderness.
Dogman fascinates with his sincerity: it is a visceral work, which speaks of faith, forgiveness and identity through a baroque and melancholy lens. A film that shocks, moves and divides but which undoubtedly marks the return of a great author.
However, it is difficult to forgive Besson for his hyper-realistic overloads of many sequences, especially when the plot gets lost in discontinuous episodesalternating moments of intense pathos with redundant and mannerist passages. Caleb Landry Jones’ performance won everyone over: an extraordinary and hypnotic interpretation which transforms every gesture into an act of rebellion and pain. An actor who, in his first leading role, with his fragile and magnetic presence substantially supports the film.
After Dogmanhe arrives DraculaBesson’s new film once again with Caleb Landy Jones
Presented at the last Rome Film Festival, Dracula – Lost Love it is the gothic and romantic rereading, in full Besson style, of the classic myth by Bram Stoker. The story follows Prince Vladimir who, in the 15th century, denied God after the tragic death of his wife and becomes Dracula (Caleb Landry Jones). Centuries later, in London, the vampire meets Mina (Zoë Bleu), a woman who resembles his deceased bride and so he embarks on a long journey to find her, confronting her immortal curse.
With music by Danny Elfmanhistorical collaborator of Tim Burton, the film also stars Matilda De Angelis in the role of Maria de Montebello. Vampire girl friend of Dracula who in the classic novel, and in previous versions, was called Lucy. A key character to the vampire’s story which the Bolognese actress embodies with charm and complexity. Released in French cinemas last August, Dracula – Lost Love will be released tomorrow in Italian cinemas.