Director Statement
Sometimes your friends ask you to participate in harebrained schemes that test the boundaries of your friendship. Such was the case years ago, when my friend Zachary asked me to help him scam an old man out of a shelter dog. At the time, I took a very indignant moral stand and we both learned a lesson about the importance of screwing people over.
This story has always told like a twisted little fable. The concept and aesthetic of a fable was my guiding principal when I approached making it as a film. I wanted everything to feel a little heightened, a little too important. Colors were brighter, music was a little more dramatic than it should be. I approached the film the way that we all experience things when we are young. Little things become big and our feelings about an event override the truth of the event itself. I was lucky to have an amazingly talented cast and crew who were able to pull off this vision on a limited schedule.
Zach and I are both owners of shelter dogs and making this film was also an opportunity to draw attention to an issue we both feel strongly about, animal adoption. We used our Kickstarter campaign to raise money for the film, but also donated a portion of our budget to the LA shelter system. Shooting at the pound was an intense experience, since we used actual rescue dogs and then were determined to find them all homes, which we successfully did. We also cast a pitbull at the request of the shelter workers, who felt they were the least often adopted and most misunderstood breed of dog. Our shelter pitbull, Franny, turned out to be a brilliant actress, holding her own with both Zach and the immensely talented Philip Baker Hall.
While I am never a fan of “issue” movies, I’m delighted that we have managed to tell a cheeky little story, that while not being directly about the issue, calls attention to something I believe in. And it is always fun when a creative collaboration between old friends bears fruit. I am very proud of everyone involved in Dog Eat Dog.
Production Notes
Funded though an overwhelmingly successful Kickstarter campaign, Dog Eat Dog is the true story of how Zachary Quinto found his first dog. During the events of his hilarious trials in attempting to adopt a shelter animal, his longtime friend, director Siân Heder, was there by his side. Taking notes. Preparing a great dinner party story. And that story, told on countless occasions, eventually evolved into the script for Dog Eat Dog. Dog Eat Dog is a twisted, fun, morality tale about the lengths to which some of us will go in order to get what we want.