One of the string of low-budget, but well-made horror films of recent years, Good Boy is most memorable for the performance of Indy.  If you somehow missed the hype, Indy is a dog who can see ghosts while the humans around him (very few for most of the film) cannot.  Indy, by the way, has his own Wikipedia page as an actor—that’s how impressive his performance is.  No doubt, he is a photogenic dog.  Credit has to go to the photographers as well, for catching the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever displaying love, anger, sadness, concern, and, most impressively, fear.  The dog received a Best Performance in Horror award normally reserved for humans.  What makes this especially impressive is that, if you think about it, Indy wasn’t aware that he was acting.  He was being a dog and has no idea what human fiction is.  Impressive.

Spoilers follow.  The story itself is a little thin: Indy’s owner, Todd, has an incurable lung disease.  He decides to move to his grandfather’s house in the woods, alone with Indy.  His grandfather died in the house of a similar disease, living there alone with his dog.  Indy begins to sense the ghosts as they drive onto the property.  Todd, whose health is failing, doesn’t notice them and begins to start shoving Indy away, even chaining him outside in the rainy autumnal weather.  Indy, ever loyal, breaks free and returns after having close encounters with the ghost.  Todd is glad to see his pet but finds his own dead body in the bed before the ghost catches up with him.  Todd’s sister finally visits and finds her dead brother and the dog abandoned in the basement.  (Since I saw this on a streaming service that cuts off credits in its eagerness to get you to watch the next film, I missed the cheering scenes of Indy with his head out the window of the sister’s car.)

Throughout the movie the human actor’s faces are never shown clearly.  This keeps the focus squarely on Indy.  It’s astounding how the dog’s range of emotional expression is slotted into the story, which is probably one reason that it’s a little thin.  You can’t explain to the star, “Now you’re seeing a ghost that your owner can’t and react like this…”.  Like The Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity, this low budget film performed well at the box office and has become a cultural touch stone among the horror community.  At least among those of us who can’t resist cute pets.