DogMan
Briarcliff Entertainment | Release Date: March 29, 2024 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
45
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 23 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
11
Negative:
7
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
58
Original-CinLiz BraunApr 4, 2024
DogMan is kind of an idiotic movie built on a ludicrous premise. This does not prevent it from being eminently watchable. Read full review
40
Los Angeles TimesTim GriersonMar 29, 2024
Jones, never winking at the rampant absurdity, gives the proceedings a little grounding. But Besson wants off the leash and his instincts lead him astray. Read full review
30
Screen RantBen GibbonsMar 29, 2024
Caleb Landry Jones, who plays the hopeful hero, is brilliant, but the rest of the cast dulls his performance and turns something with promise hollow. Read full review
30
Paste MagazineBrianna ZiglerMar 29, 2024
Compounded with dull plotting and a truly uninspired protagonist arc, Dogman is a curiosity of a comeback film that only makes you consider the virtues of director jail. Read full review
25
RogerEbert.comSimon AbramsMar 29, 2024
Besson’s extra-schlocky sensibilities seem ideally suited to his star, but he never gives Jones anything worth showing off. Read full review
55
The Daily BeastNick SchagerMar 29, 2024
It’s as big a swing as any in Besson’s career, and consequently, when it wholly and embarrassingly misses, the blow back is borderline overpowering. Read full review
90
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisMar 28, 2024
The strangest, possibly silliest movie of the veteran director’s idiosyncratic career. It is also borderline brilliant. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerMar 28, 2024
A film of immense contradictions and baffling coherency, it may be Besson’s most interesting work to date, because he finally embraces the outcast. Read full review
50
Washington PostJen YamamotoMar 27, 2024
It’s the right kind of bonkers for the right kind of audience, a gaga genre hodgepodge that, not for nothing, taps Piaf’s “Non, je ne regrette rien” as its showstopping anthem and reminds us of a truism, of both cinema and life: Adding a dog or two — or 60 — can make just about anything better. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMar 27, 2024
DogMan won’t appeal to everybody, but there’s something to be said for a movie that makes you wonder if the filmmaker has gone crazy. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineClayton DillardMar 26, 2024
Dogman seems outwardly enamored with cosmic possibilities of meaning, but Luc Besson’s script remains earthbound and unimaginative. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawMar 5, 2024
It’s shallow and insouciant, adding up to precisely nothing at all, but carried off with panache. Read full review
50
SlashfilmMatt DonatoSep 28, 2023
Dogman is one of those curios that you don't understand how it got made and just kinda marvel while it's happening, but once you try to put all the pieces together, nothing fits, and you're left wondering what the hell you just watched. Read full review
10
VarietyJessica KiangSep 6, 2023
Maybe Dogman would be salvageable if Besson didn’t feel the need to thuddingly explain every single aspect of Doug’s quirk-laden personality, as though every last thing that a person is can be traced in a straight line back to a cause, because psychology is a long division sum that never leaves a remainder. Read full review
66
TheWrapBen CrollSep 6, 2023
If Dogman has very little to say, it coasts on style amiably enough, showcasing another gonzo turn from Caleb Landry Jones, and presaging Luc Besson’s return. For good or ill, this old mutt still has some bite. Read full review
50
Screen DailyLee MarshallSep 6, 2023
Dogman may have a more intimate, reflective tone than much of his work – at least until its final man-versus-dog showdown – but it struggles to get past that initial cool pitch. Read full review
20
The TelegraphRobbie CollinSep 6, 2023
There was barely a scene in Dogman that didn’t have me yelping in disbelief. Read full review
25
The PlaylistRafaela Sales RossSep 6, 2023
Trained to precision and cute to the bone, the four-legged cast serves as a much-needed distraction from the trainwreck labeled by many as Besson’s return to the limelight. If this is all he’s got, then I guess the director will deservedly remain in the murky limbo of mediocrity. Read full review
50
IndieWireRyan LattanzioSep 6, 2023
While this film probably needed more time in the storytelling doghouse, Landry Jones’ performance is a lovely watch. Read full review
50
The Film StageLeonardo GoiSep 6, 2023
Besson hopscotches from slapstick comedy to lachrymose junctures where Landry Jones is asked to conjure a sense of catharsis Dogman never really earns. His performance is a showcase of primal gestures and bare-breasted torment, but what the actor’s tasked with embodying isn’t a character, only the chrysalis of one. Read full review
40
The GuardianCatherine BraySep 6, 2023
I’m sure there’s a way to make this theoretically fun premise work better, but regrettably Besson hasn’t found it. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterJordan MintzerSep 6, 2023
It’s a lot to handle and also a bit silly, but Besson often pulls it off — thanks in no small part to a commanding performance by the chameleon-like Caleb Landry Jones (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), who manages to be touching and slightly terrifying at the same time. Read full review
60
Total FilmJames MottramSep 1, 2023
It’s a big old mess of a movie, in other words: flawed and (sometimes) fun. Read full review
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