Not only is Mehiel committed to exploring the concepts of transness through art, but this is also a testament to the importance of having accurate representation on screen

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 15, 2024

MUTT was an excellent feature debut that left me reeling.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jun 19, 2024

If Mutt is educational in any way, it is through it's apt storytelling and truthfulness that bleeds through the screen; its significance for trans cinema cannot be overstated, but it is also once of the most accomplished debuts of 2023.

| Original Score: 8.3/10 | Nov 2, 2023

As a primer, Mutt works beautifully for those trying to get their heads around the ever-evolving concept of gender fluidity, and it’s certainly brave of the non-binary Mehiel to tackle that subject in such a head-on, soul-baring way.

| Oct 4, 2023

If you're looking for a quiet, earnest indie, there are worse options that Mutt.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Sep 20, 2023

If horror films do not raise your blood pressure, but you get secondhand stress from films like Uncut Gems (2019), it will not be as wild of a ride, but you may need to meditate afterwards.

| Original Score: 7.5/10 | Sep 19, 2023

Mehiel plays with a wealth of complicated emotions — confronting three figures from Feña’s past in his new body — across their expressive face, holding it all the pain and defiance within their tense jawline.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Sep 10, 2023

In a movie with a heightened plot and painful memories, Lungulov-Klotz never reduces his characters to a stereotype.

| Sep 8, 2023

Mutt is a triumph of queer cinema that takes in the perspective of not only Feña but the people who surround him and no one is one dimensional.

| Original Score: A | Sep 6, 2023

It’s... squarely openhearted in depicting what the freshly transitioned must navigate just to be (and explain) themselves, when all anyone else can seem to latch on to is the narrative of change they experience.

| Aug 29, 2023

“Mutt” doesn’t really travel anywhere except in circles around its beleaguered hero’s falling and rising sense of self-worth. But that’s enough...

| Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 25, 2023

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 23, 2023

Writer-director Vuk Lungulov-Klotz astutely navigates a complex situation without ever resorting to melodrama, creating a casual atmosphere in which big ideas can be discussed without fear.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Aug 22, 2023

Mutt suffers from building its story around a barrage of negative experiences, overt and subtle, that Feña goes through. It avoids the very worst extremes of transphobia, but it’s still a narrative built entirely around trauma.

| Aug 18, 2023

That these characters can exist in that murky area of confused feelings without having to lose themselves in easy vilification is a testament to the empathy with which Lungulov-Klotz utilizes throughout his story.

| Original Score: 8/10 | Aug 18, 2023

A film with a lot on its mind, a frenetic energy to make it to the end of the day, and a character we root for from start to finish.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 18, 2023

Features of city life feed a sense of realism, as does the film’s warmly-lit and intimately framed cinematography. But that realism here is exhausting, even if it is well-intentioned...

| Aug 17, 2023

This is one of those sneakily good movies where at first nothing much seems to be going on, before the parts start adding up to a satisfying whole.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Aug 16, 2023

Writer/director Vuk Lungulov-Klotz, himself trans, has made a deeply affecting, personal film about the trans experience, one of the very best LGBTQ movies, and just movies In general, of the year.

| Original Score: A- | Aug 15, 2023

That Feña suffers so that other trans people won’t have to may be edifying to some, but it also reduces Mutt to an Afterschool Special.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 13, 2023