AtanariaSome movies promise teeth but show up with nothing more than a damp nose and a wagging tail. The Dogs (2025), directed by Valerie Buhagiar, is precisely that: a film that looks menacing on the outside but whimpers once the lights go down. If you judged the movie by its poster—two snarling, hellhound-like beasts—you might brace yourself for a gnarly throwback to Cujo or The Pack. Instead, what you get is a Lifetime melodrama that occasionally remembers it’s supposed to be scary.
Spoiler alert : it isn’t.
Who Forgot To Let The Dogs Out??
Let’s start with the titular mutts. You’d expect them to be the main event, right? Wrong. The dogs clock in at maybe two minutes of total screen time across a 97-minute runtime. That’s not just burying the lede—it’s as if the lede was left on the side of the road. Instead, the film serves up a recycled domestic drama about a mother and son escaping an abusive husband. There’s also a new-school adjustment subplot, a tepid romance, and a neighbor with just enough ominous exposition to remind you that yes, technically, this is filed under “horror.”
Only, it isn’t. Not in any recognizable sense of the word. The scares are so toothless that even the Goosebumps TV show from the ’90s feels like The Exorcist in comparison.
Snooze Button Cinema
One reviewer admitted to falling asleep halfway through. Honestly, that might be the most merciful way to experience The Dogs. The pacing is glacial, the story arc predictable, and the “haunting” elements so cliché they feel like cut-and-paste jobs from other, better films. If you’re waiting for a payoff, you’ll be waiting forever.
Visually, the movie does nothing to distinguish itself either. Forget striking imagery, moody lighting, or even memorable set pieces—the cinematography is as flat as the script. It’s horror at its most pedestrian, horror by committee, horror stripped of its claws.
Talent Strays but Doesn’t Salvage
The silver lining? The cast is filled with fresh faces. Unfamiliar actors can often inject a movie with unexpected vitality, but here, they’re shackled by a script that leaves them wandering in circles. The performances are fair, occasionally even earnest, but the material gives them nothing to sink their teeth into.
The Best Thing About The Dogs? Its Poster.
And that’s the ultimate insult: the most frightening thing about The Dogs is how misleading its cover art is. Two demon-eyed hounds promising carnage? Sign me up. But what you get is a limp domestic ghost story without the guts—or the dogs—to back it up. It’s a classic case of over-sell and under-deliver.
Atanaria’s Final Words
The Dogs is a horror movie in name only. If you’re a genre fan, do yourself a favor: skip this one and rewatch Cujo instead. Or even White Dog, which managed to be scarier, smarter, and infinitely more unsettling over 40 years ago.
I’m going to rate it a 2 out of 10…. and that’s me being generous.
