Movies
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
Wide Releases
Now In Theaters
76
(500) Days of Summer
60
9
17
All About Steve
37
Amelia
53
Astro Boy
66
Bandslam
45
Box, The
61
Capitalism: A Love Story
55
Christmas Carol, A
43
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
66
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
29
Collector, The
23
Couples Retreat
80
District 9
61
Extract
39
Fame
30
Final Destination, The
34
Fourth Kind, The
60
Funny People
32
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra
27
Gamer
41
G-Force
39
Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard, The
46
Halloween II
73
Hangover, The
78
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
55
I Can Do Bad All By Myself
66
Informant!, The
69
Inglourious Basterds
58
Invention of Lying, The
47
Jennifer's Body
66
Julie & Julia
34
Law Abiding Citizen
33
Love Happens
54
Men Who Stare At Goats, The
67
Michael Jackson's This Is It
51
My Sister's Keeper
42
Orphan
28
Pandorum
63
Perfect Getaway, A
86
Ponyo
35
Post Grad
48
Proposal, The
30
Saw VI
53
Shorts
24
Sorority Row
83
Star Trek
33
Stepfather, The
45
Surrogates
55
Taking Woodstock
47
Time Traveler's Wife
96
Toy Story/Toy Story 2 3D
35
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
28
Ugly Truth, The
88
Up
71
Where the Wild Things Are
67
Whip It
28
Whiteout
73
Zombieland
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
Limited Releases
Now In Theaters
58
(Untitled)
96
35 Shots of Rum
56
Adam
72
Adela
39
Adventures of Power
78
Afghan Star
61
After the Storm
66
Afterschool
xx
All the Best
58
American Casino
72
Amreeka
48
Antichrist
73
Araya
62
Art & Copy
55
As Seen Through These Eyes
76
Baader Meinhof Complex, The
86
Beaches of Agnes, The
13
Beautiful Life, A
70
Beeswax
35
Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
71
Big Fan
66
Black Dynamite
51
Blind Date
xx
Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly
76
Bliss
35
Blue Tooth Virgin, The
26
Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, The
57
Boys Are Back, The
45
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
81
Bright Star
70
Bronson
45
Burning Plain, The
xx
Carriers
55
Casi Divas
57
Chelsea on the Rocks
62
Cloud 9
65
Coco Before Chanel
69
Cold Souls
59
Collapse
44
Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha
82
Cove, The
75
Crude
82
Damned United, The
67
Departures
xx
Dil Bole Hadippa
71
Disgrace
xx
Do Knot Disturb
70
Earth Days
24
Eating Out 3: All You Can Eat
85
Education, An
55
Endgame
xx
Eulogy for a Vampire
xx
Everyone Else
xx
Fatal Promises
56
Fifty Dead Men Walking
62
Five Minutes of Heaven
74
Flame & Citron
49
Food Beware: The French Organic Revolution
80
Food, Inc.
28
Free Style
xx
From Mexico with Love
50
Fuel
25
Gentlemen Broncos
50
Give Me Your Hand
58
Gogol Bordello Non-Stop
72
Good Hair
89
Goodbye Solo
52
Grace
64
Harmony and Me
81
Headless Woman, The
xx
Heretics, The
63
Horse Boy, The
73
House of the Devil, The
xx
How to Seduce Difficult Women
74
Humpday
94
Hurt Locker, The
29
I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell
16
If One Thing Matters: A Film About Wolfgang Tillmans
75
In Search of Beethoven
83
In the Loop
61
Intimate Enemies
42
Irene in Time
70
It Might Get Loud
46
Killing Kasztner
19
Labor Day
xx
Laila's Birthday
41
Little Ashes
41
Little Traitor, The
66
Liverpool
34
Looking for Palladin
80
Lorna's Silence
83
Maid, The
xx
Ministers, The
59
More Than a Game
67
Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, The
34
Motherhood
62
My One and Only
xx
Mystery Team
48
New York, I Love You
73
Night and Day
66
No Impact Man
47
Ong Bak 2: The Beginning
34
Other Man, The
xx
Painter Sam Francis, The
54
Paper Heart
xx
Paradise
68
Paranormal Activity
68
Paris
44
Peter and Vandy
35
Play the Game
77
Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
xx
Pretty Ugly People
65
Providence Effect, The
76
Rembrandt's J'accuse
69
September Issue, The
79
Serious Man, A
40
Shrink
61
Skin
77
Skin Too Few: The Days of Nick Drake, A
xx
Skiptracers
46
Splinterheads
39
St. Trinian's
89
Still Walking
50
Stoning of Soraya M., The
55
Storm
65
Tetro
70
That Evening Sun
72
Thirst
xx
Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D (re-release)
61
Trucker
xx
Turning Green
83
U2 3D
66
Unmade Beds
66
Unmistaken Child
70
Visual Acoustics
55
Walt & El Grupo
67
Way We Get By, The
69
We Live in Public
64
Wedding Song, The
64
Where is Where?
xx
White on Rice
74
Woman in Berlin, A
69
World's Greatest Dad
70
Yes Men Fix the World
69
Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg
xx
You, the Living
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
Year of the Dog
Generally favorable reviews
Based on 31 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 19 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama
Written by: Mike White
Directed by: Mike White
Release Date:
Theatrical: April 13, 2007
DVD: August 28, 2007
Running Time: 97 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for some suggestive references
Starring Molly Shannon, Laura Dern, Regina King, Thomas McCarthy, Josh Pais, John C. Reilly, Peter Sarsgaard, and Amy Schlagel
When Peggy (Shannon) loses her best friend, a Beagle named Pencil, she emerges from her loss with a new found sense of her place in the world and what it takes to make her happy. (Paramount Vantage)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
I mean no impertinence when I say that as a portrait of love and grief, writer-director Mike White's exceptional film Year of the Dog deserves the same admiration accorded Joan Didion's exceptional memoir "The Year of Magical Thinking."
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin
White's gently perceptive film is a funny, poignant, emotionally honest minor-key character study.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Toddy Burton
Dern is hilarious as the obsessive sister-in-law, Sarsgaard plays oddball dog-man to perfection, Pais is perfectly awkward as Peggy's nervous boss, Reilly rocks the subtle humor of Peggy's hunting-obsessed neighbor, and Shannon gives a breakout performance.
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
Until Year of the Dog, I've never seen a movie where someone obsessed over a puppy.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Ken Fox
It may sound as if first-time director White is having his fun at the expense of introverted, asocial people who prefer the company of cats and dogs and gravitate toward animal-rights activism because the very idea of dealing with human problems requires an empathy they can't muster. But empathy is exactly what makes the film work.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman
While some may be put off by Peggy's wild-eyed mania, and the film's broadly comic tone, Shannon makes this lost spirit strikingly sympathetic.
Read Full Review >Premiere Ethan Alter
Year of the Dog would have benefited from a stronger hand behind the camera (White's general aesthetic basically involves cribbing heavily from Wes Anderson and Jared Hess), but as a showcase for Shannon, it ends up being strangely moving.
Read Full Review >New York Post Lou Lumenick
Shannon is wonderful as a woman pushed over the edge by the death of her pet in Year of the Dog, a very low-key, well-acted dramedy.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
In Year of the Dog, there are dark moments that are both strangely poignant and bizarrely hilarious. The ending took me by surprise. In a way it's a cheat, a redemption that arrives out of nowhere. But it's also a cosmic joke, a perfectly funny, sincere salute to dog and pet-lovers everywhere.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer
The conceit of the movie is that everyone is obsessed by something and never really tunes into anybody else.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
A rough little comedy of tone. White, making his directorial debut, asks if the search for self is still heroic when the discoveries are unpleasant.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Ruthe Stein
One of those quirky little movies that you marvel ever got made.
Read Full Review >USA Today Claudia Puig
An engaging tragicomedy, exploring the consequences of single-minded fervor in a humorous and humane fashion.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
Despite the gimmicky direction and a disappointing climax, this is a distinctive and unsettling comedy.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Manohla Dargis
It's funny ha-ha but firmly in touch with its downer side, which means it's also funny in a kind of existential way.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Crust
With pathos competing equally against the often pungent laughs for the audience's attention, it's a movie that is both unsettling and amusing, most comparable to "Chuck & Buck" in tone.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Ella Taylor
So oppressive is Peggy's world -- Year of the Dog is the best evocation I've seen of how much worse it is to be depressed in a sunny climate -- that when she finally loses control, it feels more like catharsis than madness.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
Year of the Dog is an enjoyable, patchy, rambling affair, a series of bittersweet comic sketches strung together with thin wire.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Duane Byrge
Overall, Year of the Dog evinces an appealing sentimentality without being maudlin or only puppy-dog cute.
Read Full Review >Variety John Anderson
A satisfying and funny, if ironic, comedy intended for lovers of both the beast and/or sophisticated laughs.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Ann Hornaday
White delivers another weirdly dark-but-funny story.
Read Full Review >Slate Dana Stevens
It's the most thorough portrait yet of the world according to White.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
White throws in a dog-in-peril shot to ensure the audience's sympathies. The ploy works, perhaps too well, turning Year of the Dog less into the askew character study it wants to be than a showcase of lovable-dog shots.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey
The ironic, cheery-bland tone, the two-dimensional characters and episodic structure, say "comedy," while the events in the script say "bipolar depression."
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Wesley Morris
Shannon gives the movie its inner life. Maybe the movie will give her back her comedy career.
Read Full Review >The New Yorker David Denby
The movie's meaning seems to be: we're all crippled in some way, so just live with it--celebrate it, even. That isn't satire; it's moss-brained sentiment that turns "sensitivity" into a dimly dejected view of life.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Rob Nelson
Mike White, writer of "Chuck & Buck" and "The School of Rock" (and oddball actor in both), here directs his latest geek's revenge fantasy like a psychotherapeutically treated Todd Solondz.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
The curious character study is a comedy in a minor key, but for all White's fascination with Peggy, he brings little conviction to the healing message under all this creepiness and social awkwardness, beyond what Shannon brings to the role.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Rick Kisonak
Billed as a comedy but it would be every bit as accurate to categorize it as science fiction or a World War II drama. It is simply not a funny film.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Peter Debruge
In Year of the Dog, director Mike White willfully violates one of the great unwritten rules of Hollywood screenwriting: Kill as many human characters as you want, just spare the dog.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 6.7 (out of 10) based on 19 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Jake T. gave it a1:
"Year of the Dog" is a movie which started out well but lost its momentum as it proceeded. Although the casting was excellent, especially in the supporting characters, the movie became a pro-PETA diatribe by the halfway point. The main character, Peggy, is impossible to empathize with as she becomes a crazy dog lady, and there is simply no reasonable message to take from the film.
Chad S. gave it an8:
And finally, when "Year of the Dog" is on the verge of caricaturizing vegans as hopeless neurotics, the filmmaker dramatizes a sort of disclaimer about animal-rights activists not all being maladjusted loner types like Peggy(Molly Shannon), as we can also see "normal" people on that same bus(en route to a rally), in a closing scene similar to the one in Todd Solondz's "Welcome to the Dollhouse". Peggy isn't alienated to the extent that Dawn Wiener was in the Solondz film, but this could all change, since her vegetarianism is now formally politicized by her forthcoming participation in a public demonstration. Peggy's newfound moral impetus of non-conformity with the social norms(she once aspired towards) will aggravate her social retardation to a degree that platonic relationships(like the benign, but functional interactions she enjoys with her office co-workers), not only potential romantic ones, will elude her as well. When Newt(Peter Saarsgard) indoctrinates Peggy into veganism, he is taking away one of the last vestiges of common ground she shares with ordinary people(which is a natural love for junk food; their reaction to the soy cupcakes is an indicator of Peggy's future). "Year of the Dog" should've gone in a direction more organic to its "Wait Until Dark"-like scene of near-violence, but this barbed comedy is still a pretty grim affair, made all the more sadder by Peggy's heart-on-a-sleeve optimism.
Ryan P. gave it a2:
Dreadfully trite and completely vapid. Molly Shannon's acting is superb throughout the film, however, the main 'love' affair of the film is entirely unbelievable and one-dimensional. The script is poorly written and every character outside of Peggy (Molly Shannon's character) is pathetically simplistic. I understand the main character is supposed to be somewhat of a tragic hero, but the idea of an adult human being with this type of mental tunnel vision able to function without constant care is ridiculous. Next, the plot functions slowly and without purpose, the primary conflict reaches a boiling point only to wrap itself up copasetically without any major consequences. On top of all of this, the film also sucked.
Aaron L. gave it a10:
Thought provoking; not afraid to intermix issues; real; and very enjoyable, cute and fun. This was a great movie.
Andrew K. gave it a6:
Wow. I can't believe how harsh some of these reviews were. I consider myself to be a good judge when it comes to films. I guess I can see some of the things that people are saying, but I loved this film myself. Molly Shannon, while I worried at first that I wouldn't be able to take her serious due to her facial expressions reminding me so much of her silly characters on SNL, really surprised the hell out of me. She was amazing. I hope that this will bring her more work, because she is very good. I completely related to the way she would be the good listener with everyone she knew even though she really wasn't as interested in them as she pretended to be. Maybe that sounds shallow of me, but I think that a lot of people make their problems out to be so important to the people around them and sometimes all you can do is nod and humor them. Maybe some of the characters were a little one dimensional, but I don't really expect much more depth in these peripheral characters. I think the point is that she's not really all that interested in them because they actually do lack depth. Needless to say, I thought that Laura Dern and Peter Saarsgard and Regina King and Josh Pais did a great job. They were all irritating in some way, especially Laura Dern, who reminded me of some of the parents my mother has to put up with as a teacher. I can see how some would compare Mike White's directorial style to Jarod Hess. It did have a Napoleon Dynamite type feel, and it even featured one of the same songs near the end of the film. This was a very sweet movie and I think that the statements it makes about animal cruelty are actually very important and are not meant to be taken as a joke. Molly Shannon's character is very real. I felt great sympathy for her. I don't know what separates the people that don't like this movie from those that do, and so I think that it deserves a shot from all movie lovers.
Jimmy R. gave it an8:
I loved this little movie. It offers so much more than one might expect. Laura Dern (& the guy who plays her hubby) are both dead-on hilarious. I'm a private tutor and I work w/clients like these people daily. I had to avert my eyes during their scenes, it was too painful. Sarsgaard and Shannon both do excellent work, and Josh Pais (the boss) is scarily hilarious. I strongly recommend.
Jack Smithee gave it a1:
The movie is an hour and a half of awkward silence interrupted now and then by drab caricatures. The actors are all good, but the characters are unlikeable and unbelievable. So many elements rang false I don't know where to begin. A neurotic woman who is terrified of allergies has 4 fur coats? In Southern California? I'll admit that I was biased by the trailers which portrayed the movie as a quirky romantic comedy, but I love dark, eccentric character studies and this was just tedious.
