The Flicker

A Flicker Reflection - A Boy and His Dog (1975)

Posted in My Flickin' Reviews

01Apr

boy-and-his-dog

A Boy and His Dog

1975

Rated R

Directed by: L. Q. Jones

Source: Netflix

Plot: Think Mad Max but with Don Jonson and the dog from Fraggle Rock.

Acting: Quite laughable. Its a very young Don Jonson plus the dog can talk.

Special Effects: Extremely low budget + made in 1975 = muwhahaha!

The Skinny: This flick quickly moves from strange to peculiar to downright WTF?!?

We open in the year 2024 in an America apparently destroyed by the results of WWIV. We are informed that the war only lasted 5 days, just enough time for the world’s nuclear weapons to turn our environment into a barren wasteland. The survivors are few in numbers and even rarer are females. And here is where we are introduced to our hero Vic played by a young Don Johnson.

Show here years before the invention of t-shirt under pastel suit coat with sockless loafers.

We see Vic ducking behind a sand dune watching a group of men in the distance. As the men leave Vic jumps up running to where the men had been. Suddenly we hear a gruff regal narrative voice warning him that one man still remains in the area the group had been and Vic should hide. As Vic dives behind another dune I’m wondering who this voice belongs to. Who is guiding Vic seemingly telepathically, keeping him out of danger. After the men have disappeared and the danger gone the voice of Vic’s guardian angel trots into frame. It is a dog and he can communicate with Vic via telepathy.

I has a hotdog?

Through a quick back story it is established that Vic and his dog Blood have known each other for quite some time and Blood is able to communicate with Vic but not with anyone else. The two rely on each other for very specific things. Blood relies on Vic for food, mainly popcorn, his favorite food. Vic relies on Blood for booty. And no, Vic isn’t into bestiality. Blood has a nose for the ladies. Hence the first scene where Blood is leading Vic to something. That something was a female and Blood can find them. Now since gals are few and far between and Vic is a walking hard-on this works out pretty well for him. Its frustrating to Blood though since he is obviously more intelligent than Vic and this causes them to fight constantly like an episode of The Odd Couple.

I said you'll get your popcorn when I get this corn popped!

During a run on a local hang out Blood picks up the scent of a female. Understandably Vic is peeing his pants with excitement and zeros in on the babe in disguise. He follows her to her hideout and proceeds to sneak-attack her while she changes. As Vic prepares to have his way with his newly found spoils Blood busts in warning of approaching men. This develops into a shoot out with Vic, his love slave, and Blood barely escaping. The reason they survive is because during the fire fight they are all visited by something even the invading raiders are scared of. They are called Screamers and we are led to believe they are mutants left over from the war although we don’t actually see them. All we hear is shrieking from off screen and a green light. Told you, low budget.

Now that we've survived the Green Lantern you may ravish me.

Now that we've survived the Green Lantern u may ravish me.

So as you can imagine the night goes well for Vic. Not so much for Blood, imagine being a kid and walking in on your parents and then having the door lock behind you. Not pretty. But as this romantic night unfolds we discover this honey is actually from an underground settlement called Topeka and was sent to ground level in search of a man of desirable characteristics. As night turns into morning Blood informs them it is safe to exit their hiding place and Vic pleads with the girl to forget her home and push forth with them. She replies with a strike to his noggin, knocking him out. When Vic regains consciousness, she is long gone although it appears she has left some type of swipe card behind. How convenient. Vic still feeling the afterglow of the night’s activities decides to pursue his new love against Blood’s misgivings. After a day of walking they discover the apparent entrance to the underground community. Blood is set against joining Vic and decides to sit this one out. Vic no longer thinking with his head uses the swipe card to gain entrance and disappears into the abyss.

Cya later dawg!

Here we move from peculiar to WTF?!? Vic finds the community and discovers it is run by the committee. By mandate everyone wears this creepy mime makeup while propaganda constantly spews from speakers scattered throughout the camp. The committee is made up of three senior members and makes all decisions regarding the community. They attempt to befriend Vic and recruit him for their needs. See in order for their little happy family to keep going they obviously need to reproduce but this can only happen so many times until the procreation is powered by incest. As you can imagine although as strange as they are this is frowned upon. So they had sent up their chick-a-dee to find a strapping young man to return and impregnate their women of child bearing age. Vic being a man is ecstatic and pledges his promise to help. Hey a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do, right?

Next order of business: who is gonna bang our Bettys?

Careful what you wish for, Vic. In the next scene Vic finds out exactly what the committee had in mind when they asked his help and it didn’t involve (as I’m sure Vic pictured) runnin’ a train thru deez ho’s. Instead Vic is shown strapped to a hospital bed with a vacuum tube attached to his twig-n-berries. A preacher stands next to him while a line of ladies in wedding dresses extends out into the hallway. And as his man juice is extracted he is ceremonial wed to each woman in turn. Man, talk about buzz-kill! Lucky for Vic the next gal in line is the sweet pea he met upstairs in the real world and she proceeds to break him out, sucker punching the preach and rescuing Vic. As the two run away with sirens blaring, the committee sends their muscle man after them. Which we soon find out is not really a man at all.

Oh hai! I will be killing you now.

Their daring escape is successful due to some local help and some quick thinking by Vic. I didn’t think he had it in him! Our newly ordained hero explains how she is tired of the committee and their commune and wants to accompany Vic into the real world. Vic just being happy to be off the operating table agrees to her request and they bust out of the basement mime-town. When they reach the surface, unfortunately Blood is no where to be found. Vic is visibly distraught realizing that he’s picked tail over his one true friend. Suddenly Blood’s raspy narrative voice is heard by Vic and he discovers him laid out a few yards away. Blood is in bad shape. Unable to forge for food while Vic was gone, he is on the brink of starvation. As Vic stands over him unsure of what to do next, his new arm candy begs him to abandon his best friend and continue on with just her. Not a good move sista.

The final scene is the cherry on top of this fucked up sundae. Only Vic and Blood are seen walking away from a smoldering fire pit. The two joke back and forth as Blood obviously is feeling better than previously. And then Blood referring to Vic’s girlfriend, delivers one of the greatest lines to end the film:

“Well, I’d certainly say she had marvelous judgment……if not particularly good taste.”

Yeah that's right. They ate the bitch.

The Verdict:

From its tag line, “A rather kinky tale of survival” I figured A Boy and His Dog was going to be a bit on the kooky side. But I kept running into this flick all over, it seemed every critic’s top ten sci-fi movie list included this bad boy and it was usually described as an under appreciated gem. So, I had to give it a shot. In the weird department, the story is rubber stamped approved. From the telepathic dog to the mime makeup wearing geezers, this flick constantly had me going What the What? Now typically I love these kind of flicks, stories of the strange and all, but here I think it fell a bit short. I don’t know if it was Don Johnson’s performance or the feeling that Blood’s voice didn’t seem right or the lack of good special effects but even though I chuckled at the last line of the film, when the credits rolled I felt unsatisfied. I would still suggest checking it out but only in the name of scientific study. The weirdness is reason enough but don’t go into it ready for a classic. It’s more of a quirky one-hit wonder.