I can’t remember a film as poorly marketed as The Dog Stars, Ridley Scott’s latest lone-survivor-esque film. And that appears to have culminated in, at the time of writing, a Rotten Tomatoes score of just 38%.
Compare that with 2015’s The Martian, which is sitting at a very different 91%, and it tells you something has gone very wrong indeed.
The marketing of The Dog Stars has been a bizarre affair. Its trailers painted it as an action-heavy survival film, while its presence outside of cinemas has been limited to a couple of spots on Netflix and terrestrial TV in the week running up to its general release.
So, it’s perhaps no surprise that audiences have gone in expecting something very different from what Ridley Scott has actually made. But what is the finished product actually like?
Survivors of a deadly pandemic traverse a post-apocalyptic landscape to find the origin of a mysterious radio transmission and discover whether there’s any hope left for humanity.
Scott has been very hit and miss as a director over the years. We’ve had all-time great sci-fi films like Alien and The Martian, alongside incredible blockbusters such as Gladiator. But then you’re brought right back down to earth with unnecessary sequels and poorly written films like Prometheus and Alien: Covenant.
After reading the overwhelmingly negative reviews on both Rotten Tomatoes and social media, I was expecting The Dog Stars to be an absolute catastrophe.
Thankfully, it is nothing of the sort.
A different kind of apocalypse
What it actually is, is a slow-burn character drama that asks us to sit back and follow a small group of individuals as they learn to live and cope in a world ravaged by a viral pandemic. Alongside the constant threat of the elements, they must also protect themselves from roaming scavengers known as Reapers.
Jacob Elordi is our main protagonist, Hig, a civilian pilot and former mechanic living with his best friend and all-round good boy, Jasper. He’s joined by Bangley (Josh Brolin), an aloof, gun-toting former Marine.
During a routine reconnaissance flight, Hig hears a radio transmission that piques his interest, setting him off on a journey from the relative safety of home to discover its source.
And this is where The Dog Stars really starts to shine.
To look at, the film is absolutely exquisite. Soaring landscapes and lush greenery are beautifully juxtaposed with the ruins of Denver when Hig ventures into the city to collect supplies for neighbouring communities. Scott has always been known for his eye for landscapes, but cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt really elevates things here.
A large part of that is down to the decision to keep unnecessary CGI to a minimum. There’s a real dog playing Jasper rather than an entirely computer-generated creation, while much of the film was shot on location in Italy and the Alpine foothills.
Some soundstaging is used, but the lack of green-screen landscapes adds an authenticity to the film that is sorely missing from a lot of blockbusters nowadays. You can almost feel the cold air and smell the pine trees.
A cast that makes the slow burn work
The cast is equally strong. Elordi is utterly believable as a grieving former mechanic struggling to let go of his past, even as new people begin to enter his life, namely a father and daughter duo played by Guy Pearce and Margaret Qualley. His chemistry with Josh Brolin is particularly good, with their banter providing some much-needed humour and warmth.
They’re two completely different individuals thrown together by a catastrophic event, forced to learn how to live with each other’s personalities. It’s one of the film’s most human elements, and one of the reasons the slower pace works so well.
So yes, The Dog Stars is much more of a character drama than I think many people were expecting. But when the action does arrive, it’s filmed with the confidence you’d expect from a veteran director.
A first-person night-vision battle against a group of Reapers is particularly effective, giving us a glimpse of the action-heavy film the trailers promised.
And then there’s Allison Janney.
Her third-act appearance, channelling her best former stewardess, is a fascinating tonal shift that, in the hands of a less experienced director, could easily feel like it belongs in a completely different movie. Here, however, it works well and adds a change of tempo as we approach the film’s quiet finale. Despite her limited screen time, Janney almost steals the show.
Ultimately, The Dog Stars is sadly a victim of its own marketing campaign. By presenting audiences with an action-heavy post-apocalyptic thriller, the trailers created unrealistic expectations of what the finished film was going to be. And those expectations appear to have played a significant role in the overwhelmingly negative reaction.
No, this isn’t an action film. It’s a quiet, slow and brooding character drama that asks us to look at our own humanity – what it means to be human in the face of something truly dreadful.
If you’re going in expecting shootouts against zombie-like villains, you’ll probably be sorely disappointed.
But if you want emotion, beautiful landscapes, committed performances and a thoughtful exploration of survival, The Dog Stars deserves far more attention than its current reputation suggests.
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