...an emotional and intimate film, loaded with biting commentary on the harsh realities of contemporary China. [Full review in Spanish]

| Apr 21, 2025

Mixing elements of film noir and western, Guan splices social realism, bone-dry humour and surrealism to beguilingly enigmatic effect.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 4, 2025

While the plot runs out of gas and occasionally threatens to go off the rails, Guan’s strong visual direction ensures that “Black Dog” never ceases to be interesting.

| Original Score: B | Jan 30, 2025

...a very human and universal narration of a quasi-symbiotic friendship between species...[Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 7/10 | Jan 13, 2025

Bleak realities are rendered handsome in this offbeat noir featuring a moody young biker released from prison, who finds his hometown overrun by stray dogs

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 4, 2025

This is a man and dog versus the rest drama with a social conscience and a deadpan sense of humour.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jan 3, 2025

This profoundly affecting tale of reintegration, loneliness, and human resilience is both a bold sociopolitical critique and an intimate exploration of personal struggles.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Dec 26, 2024

The intense and fascinating vision and lens through which Guan Hu observes everything makes Black Dog unforgettable and haunting long after watching.

| Original Score: 9.5/10 | Dec 4, 2024

Black Dog is an impressive and unexpected film experience.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Nov 28, 2024

Visually, Guan never puts a frame wrong, whether he’s setting up a physical comedy set-piece, idly incorporating a solar eclipse or letting the dogs steal a scene.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 11, 2024

Next to Umberto D., Chinese director Guan Hu may just have made the enduring masterpiece of man-and-dog movies -- Citizen Canine, if you will -- in this soul-filling homecoming odyssey set on the windswept fringes of the Gobi Desert.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 11, 2024

Hu’s Black Dog is a remarkable tale of companionship that hits in all the right spots.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 3, 2024

Via a blossoming relationship between a man and a dog, Guan manages to create something that is both sweeping and intimate.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 3, 2024

Tracing the contours of foolish masculinity and its consequences, Black Dog is a drifting melody of melancholy lifted by the hope that floats above the sting of windborne grit.

| Sep 1, 2024

Guan is clearly a director with a good mix of technique and commitment, plus a healthy eye for the oddball. He’s interested in the stresses of rural depopulation, but doesn’t want to scold his society for too many deeper flaws.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 30, 2024

The balance of warmth and deadpan comedy is quite the tightrope walk but Black Dog pulls it off, making the film comparable to the work of Wes Anderson in more ways than one...

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 29, 2024

Black Dog registers as an existential fable about isolation, redemption, the possibility of making connections against the odds. It is also a crime thriller and a dazzling piece of landscape cinema.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 29, 2024

It’s full of little things that are realistic on their own, but quite meaningful in a subtle way.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 28, 2024

Gang diminishes the film’s power with a surfeit of storylines that require multiple endings to wrap up. When focussed on the straightforward human/canine redemption story at its core, it’s much harder to resist.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 27, 2024

Director-cowriter Guan Hu has a terrific eye for insightful, offbeat details, so the film looks stylish as it delivers a strong emotional punch.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 27, 2024