Los Horror film creators have always explored different ways of representing fear.but none had put the viewer on the spot. height of a dog. The narrative usually focuses on the human reaction to the unknown, while the animals are relegated to a residual role, if they have one.

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In Good Boy, from the American screenwriter and director Ben Leonbergthat order is completely reversed. The story transforms the traditional point of view and converts a real dog in the emotional and narrative axis of a story set in an isolated house where supernatural forces manifest.

Three years of filming to achieve an authentic animal look

The film, which Leonberg presented with his dog Indy at the Sitges festival, it is his first feature film after a long career of short films. As explained in an interview published in GQfilming lasted three years becauseand worked only with his petwithout resorting to animals trained to act.

The result is a film in which each shot was conceived from the dog's point of view. The director designed a storyboard completely before filming and used the camera at an unusual height to reproduce the animal's perspective. Thus, when a human figure appears, the The public only sees knees or shadows that hint at their presence. In fact, there is always something that prevents us from seeing human faces clearly.

He off-field it becomes an essential tool to create tension. By keeping the camera at ground level, any foreign element is perceived as a threat without directly showing it. Leonberg applied the principle of Kuleshov effect to suggest emotions in Indy: at juxtapose his calm face with images of lights, hallways or noises, the viewer interprets fear where there is only curiosity. From that illusion is born the empathy that sustains the entire story.

The filming was a test of patience. Leonberg and his wife, producer of the project, They lived in the same house where it was filmed so that Indy could act naturally. Each day they recorded approximately one hour, which generated more than 400 days of work spread over three years. The team was reduced to two people and the dog, which allowed capture authentic gestures without distractions.

Leonberg explained that many of the Indy's movements arose from simple stimulilike meaningless words spoken behind the camera to make him tilt his head or fix his gaze. From those fragments they built the interpretation that is seen on screen.

A craft project that mixes terror and tenderness without cruelty

The director also decided to keep the face of the human character hidden, a resource that reinforces the idea that the absolute protagonist is the dog. The actors Shane Jensen y Arielle Friedman They lent their voices later, but the viewer's attention always remains on Indy.

He Leonberg himself played Toddthe animal's fictional owner, in some scenes and used body doubles to maintain visual coherence. The lighting, carpentry and photography were done by himself, which turned the film into a artisan work in every sense.

The screenwriter said that the idea arose from seeing Poltergeistwhen a golden retriever walks through a house sensing something strange before the humans do. From that observation he thought about build a complete story from that perspective. In the filmmaker's words, “we used a deeply shared idea as primary DNA” and adapted it to animal sensitivity. The result is a story that associates fear with dogs' limited perception of stimuli they do not understand.

Fear turns into tenderness without losing its disturbing pulse

In Good Boythe paranormal threat coexists with a more intimate reading of mortality. Leonberg approached the relationship between a dog and its owner from a emotional perspective that avoids habitual cruelty of the genre. He rejected from the beginning the possibility of Indy dying in the plot. "We always wanted Indy to survive because that's also the right resolution to his hero's journey."”, he stated.

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The project, started almost as an experiment, ended placing the Good Boy among the most unique proposals of terror recent. Leonberg recognizes the influence of The thing by John Carpenter and the intention to achieve that level of precision with a dog as the protagonist. Its purpose was to create a scary movie that also functioned as a portrait of affection and learning between a human being and their pet. With that combination of craftsmanship, patience and original look, Good Boy shows that fear can also be told from the ground, to the rhythm of a dog exploring a house and its own loyalty.