It’s been seven years since the release of Laurie Anderson’s elegy for her beloved rat terrier Lolabell, Heart of a Dog, and its simple, mesmerizing beauty has stayed in my heart all this time.

| Feb 13, 2024

Heart of a Dog is a triumph and not simply in its love and candor, but in its calming ease that gently reminds viewers: no matter what, everything will be OK.

| Aug 2, 2019

Anderson is auteur, narrator, and guide, grasping our hands and settling us into her vast and gorgeous mind-scape through seamlessly-mixed media and an astonishingly enveloping sound design...

| Apr 9, 2019

This film's disjointed structure and emotional reticence would make a better album than a movie. An album also doesn't demand an engaging overall story to hold our attention, but many of the scenes in this fairly short film had me nodding off.

| Mar 7, 2019

All around a daring and moving experience that deserves to be seen.

| Feb 6, 2019

Like much of Anderson's work, Heart of a Dog takes the form of casually constructed, almost meandering reminiscences, while at the same time never losing its tightly structured focus and drive.

| Aug 25, 2018

With this film, [director Laurie Anderson] proves herself to be a capable director.

| Feb 15, 2018

In the case of Heart of a Dog, the only importance is attached to the name of artist who signed this film.

| Nov 14, 2017

... it restores a sense of calm to its subject without evading the most haunting questions.

| Sep 21, 2017

Nonlinear and exploratory, Heart of a Dog is elusive by design.

| Sep 11, 2017

[Heart of a Dog] is an achingly beautiful documentary.

| Aug 22, 2017

Anderson's film accomplishes something rare in that it touches a part of human experience that is seldom seen or felt, diving deep into a dark river to feel about for something precious.

| Aug 16, 2017

In her own way, Anderson always has been about finding meaning where most people don't think to look. Here she looks for it in that most confusing of places: her own memory, especially of important nurturance that she's received.

| Jul 25, 2017

'Arty,' to be sure, but it's not pretentious: rather, it's expressive of the scattered state of mind, the reflective state of mind, that attends grief. [Criterion Collection Blu-ray]

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jan 24, 2017

The film is often notable for Anderson's honesty.

| Jan 10, 2017

A lurching, lyrical expression of everything that makes existence what it is.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Jan 8, 2017

Imagery and philosophy circle back and then veer forward, but it's a perceptive work that finds a transformative power in genuine sadness.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Dec 9, 2016

Fans of Anderson's work and those with an inquisitive spiritual hunger will find this a thoughtful and sincere gift.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 21, 2016

Earnest, resonant and revealing.

| Nov 20, 2016

Incredibly poignant.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 26, 2016