Matteo Garrone’s Dogman opens with a snarl. An angry dog is chained to a tiled wall. Marcello, a vet/groomer is carefully attempting to bathe the dog with a cloth draped over the end of a broom. The dog tries to wrestle the rags away and the scene appears to us as an impossible situation. Cut to moments later and Marcello is hosing off the now docile beast and it is clear this man has a way with canines. If dog is a man’s best friend, what is his worst enemy?

In Garrone’s breakout hit Gomorrah, he showed us a seedy version of Italy. Gangsters and random acts of violence were the norm. Dogman marks a return for the director, as Marcello’s dog grooming shop is housed in a dilapidated building beside a pawn shop and slot machine house, on a run down boardwalk outside of Rome. He spends time walking dogs, drinking with other local proprietors and looking after his daughter on occasion.

He also makes a living selling cocaine. We quickly meet his biggest customer, Simone, a hulking, sociopathic low-life with poor impulse control. Taming this beast is no easy feat and it becomes apparent that with Simone, Marcello is in over his head. It is hard to say whether it is fear or compassion that drives Marcello to help his friend, but slowly this relationship becomes a detriment to Marcello’s life.

The setting of the abandoned beachfront boardwalk is beautifully shot and Marcello Fonte’s performance as the meek dog lover is absolutely deserved of the best actor prize he won at Cannes. He slowly transforms throughout the film from a simple, sentimental man to something much darker. We are left, at the end, unsure of our hero’s motives, the situation he finds himself in and whether or not he makes the right choice, or if there is even a right choice to begin with.