White God

I have to say that I wasn't really all that inclined to see Kornei Mundruczo's White Dog (2014) even after hearing a positive podcast review by Slate on the film. But then a friend recommended it to me, so I thought I'd give it a go. I must say I was drawn in by the opening sequence, first there is a quote from Rilke: "Everything terrible is something that needs our love." Before we get to the start of the story we get to see a cow being slaughtered! Then we see a sequence in which the main human protagonist, Lili (Zsofia Psotta) rides her bicycle through a seeming abandoned city until a pack of dogs turn a corner and race after her-it is a striking and powerful sequence and cold opening, from there it return to the beginning of the story where Lili is dropped off at he father's house with her pet dog Hagen. Unfortunately the film doesn't live up to the auspicious beginning, but the non-CGI dogs and individual scenes of dog actor are impressive. It is something of a muddled parable-that some suggest that it is a parable about separatism and Hungarian politics during democratic rule, I don't know enough about Hungarian politics to confirm this. But I have also seen suggestions that he has borrowed from Samuel Fuller's 1982 film White Dog, and reminds me that I still haven't seen it. This is definitely not for those who are queasy with animal violence and blood.