Dogtooth
Kino International | Release Date: June 25, 2010 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
72
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 18 Critic Reviews
Positive:
15
Mixed:
2
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Time OutJoshua Rothkopf
How perfectly perverse: In a summer crammed with sequels, remakes, '80s nostalgia and the frustrated sense of "What else y'got?" comes the most original nightmare in years. Read full review
100
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
It's an exhilaratingly unpredictable experience, and not an easy one to shake. Read full review
100
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
Dogtooth, a bizarre black comedy from Greece that won the Un Certain Regard prize at the 2009 Cannes film festival, involves a conventional middle-class family--mom, dad, teenage son, two teenage daughters--that turns out to be warped beyond belief. Read full review
90
Film ThreatAlex SavelievJun 23, 2025
The film effortlessly examines hefty themes like freedom, toxic masculinity, privilege, familial bonds (and the need to escape them). Read full review
88
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Jennie PunterJan 28, 2011
Lanthumos's accomplished and fascinating Dogtooth pushes the notion of parents screwing up their kids into seriously disturbing and darkly comic terrain. Read full review
80
EmpirePhilip Wilding
As harrowing as it is humorous, Giorgos Lanthimos' award-winning journey to a family's heart of darkness is unflinchingly detailed, thought-provoking fare. Read full review
80
MovielineMichelle Orange
A brightly lit nightmare of patriarchy run amok. Read full review
80
Boxoffice MagazineSteve Ramos
Dogtooth will begin to open the door for U.S. specialty audiences to discover Lanthimos as a new master and anticipate his future films. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Dogtooth is like a car crash. You cannot look away. The Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos tells his story with complete command of visuals and performances. His cinematography is like a series of family photographs of a family with something wrong with it. Read full review
75
New York PostV.A. Musetto
A highly original black comedy from Greece -- and one of the weirdest movies I've seen in a long time. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
Dogtooth is slightly less self-congratulatory than the average Dogme movie, a few of which belong to Lars von Trier. This feels, instead, more like an extreme summer at a Dadaist acting camp. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleDavid Lewis
Doesn't rank as a great film, but it's difficult to take your eyes off it, as you wonder what impossibly bizarre thing might happen next. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeFore
Horror and cold humor commingle in Dogtooth, a Greek import whose screenwriters approach scenario construction like misanthropic social scientists planning an experiment -- one whose result suggests that governments might want to rethink policies allowing parents to home-school their children. Read full review
70
VarietyBoyd Van Hoeij
The Greek helmer's sophomore picture does exude a strange fascination throughout. Read full review
70
Village VoiceKarina Longworth
Director Giorgos Lanthimos lays out the rules largely through action rather than exposition, which allows Dogtooth to play as a richly satisfying, blackly comic mystery in spite of its delayed, horror-sourced housebreak plot. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesMark OlsenJan 6, 2011
Though its elusive character is undoubtedly part of its strength, Dogtooth ends up feeling somehow like a dodge and a sidestep. As a film, it's pure and singular, but it's not quite fully formed enough to be what one could call truly visionary. Read full review
50
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
Dogtooth supplies no such explanation and at times seems as much an exercise in perversity as an examination of it. Read full review
20
New York Daily NewsJoe Neumaier
The father is the only one who can leave the house to go to his factory job, and that seems like a paradise for viewers trapped watching this clinically shot claptrap. Read full review
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