Good Boy Review: Indy and the Evil Within

Every year horror fans chase “the next thing”—a fresh perspective that makes the familiar frightening again. Some filmmakers look to new technology, others mine folklore or older titles for reboot material. Director Ben Leonberg went smaller, asking an obvious question no one explored with conviction before: what if the family dog was the only one who knew the house was haunted? Out of that “what if” came Good Boy, a compact thriller told almost entirely from the perspective of a loyal retriever named Indy. Premiering at SXSW 2025 and scooped up by IFC/Shudder, the debut turns a gimmicky premise into one of the year’s most heartfelt horror experiences. Indy even earned the festival’s inaugural “Howl of Fame” award.

And yes, let’s settle this up front: Indy survives. Dog lovers can breathe easy and enjoy the ride.

At a lean 72 minutes (including credits), Good Boy is deliberate and hypnotic in how it follows Indy’s wary gaze. The Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever relocates with his owner, Todd (Shane Jensen), to a long-vacant family home deep in the rural woods. Todd, suffering from a chronic lung illness, retreats into the crumbling house where his grandfather (indie horror mainstay Larry Fessenden, Brooklyn 45) once wasted away. Todd’s sister Vera (Arielle Friedman) voices concern from afar, but the closest bond here is between man and dog. From the moment Indy steps inside, his instincts pick up what his human cannot. Empty corners alive with menace. Apparitions of a long-lost retriever. A skeletal presence dragging at Todd’s already fading health. Above all else, Indy distrusts this house.

Leonberg cast his own dog as the star, working around Indy’s schedule for three years. Along with producer Kari Fischer (also his wife), he built the production around their pet, capturing Indy’s natural behavior through noises designed to make him react, strategic positioning, and treat-based motivation around furniture. It’s a remarkable achievement in patience and creativity. Indy communicates volumes through stillness, sidelong glances, and sudden bursts of fear or loyalty.

Co-writer Alex Cannon collaborated to create a dialogue-light script centered entirely on canine perception. The result feels less like animal wrangling and more like emotional expression. Those eyes convey fear, confusion, determination, and heartbreak. No CGI trickery. No anthropomorphic enhancement. Just performance. The film succeeds because Leonberg never cheats. We experience events from Indy’s limited but heightened perspective.

Indy’s ultimate survival matters because recent canine scene-stealers like Uggie (The Artist) or Messi (Anatomy of a Fall) were supporting players. Indy is Good Boy. Without him, the film collapses. With him, it soars. Jensen makes Todd sympathetic but increasingly irritable as his illness worsens. Friedman’s Vera provides a tether to normalcy that feels further away with each passing day. Stuart Rudin (Miggs from The Silence of the Lambs) appears as a neighbor who keeps reminding Todd about the fox traps around his property—another unsettling reminder of threats circling this household.

Leonberg’s cinematography stays religiously committed to dog’s-eye-level framing. Alternating between foggy exteriors and claustrophobic interiors, it grounds the supernatural in a naturalistic palette. It occasionally rises for spatial context but never betrays Indy’s viewpoint. Human faces remain cleverly obscured through shadow, backlighting, or strategic object placement. This isn’t gimmickry but purposeful storytelling. The decision enhances the effect of living in Indy’s world. Humans are important, but he doesn’t always see them as we do.

The editing lingers on Indy’s prolonged stares, testing nerves, before snapping into sudden movement. Sam Boase-Miller‘s score adds disquiet with low, droning textures and the occasional sharp strike. It’s always careful never to overwhelm the canine-centric perspective.

Admittedly, the film stretches its conceit. Staying in Indy’s POV, the film repeats a pattern—sense, investigate, startle, retreat—that can feel cyclical in the middle third. This rhythm could sustain a knockout short film; stretched to feature length, however, it risks monotony. Around the midpoint, you might wonder if forty minutes would have sufficed. Yet Indy remains so captivating that redundancy never bores. The final twenty minutes escalate into territory where protectiveness transforms into desperate action.

Leonberg inverts classic horror conventions. When Indy glances away and Todd suddenly disappears, it mirrors countless scenes of parents losing children—flipped to show a retriever’s panic. As Todd’s health deteriorates, we watch Indy’s heartbreak deepen. He can’t comprehend his master’s decline but fights regardless. The climax reframes the story not as a dog-versus-ghost showdown but as a statement on loyalty, grief, and acceptance. The film explores the terrible strength required to release someone you love. Leonberg allows us to project these human qualities onto his four-legged protagonist in its searing final moments.

The film also fits neatly into the current horror landscape. Younger audiences increasingly are seeking scares without gore that still deliver shivers. In that respect, Good Boy is a near-perfect entry point. It’s spooky without trauma, eerie without nihilism. Parents who grew up on Poltergeist or The Sixth Sense can watch this with their teens. Anyone who’s loved a dog will feel the story cut deeper than expected. Its PG-13 rating may look modest, but the film carries emotional wallop. Several effective jump scares might make even jaded viewers reach for a nightlight.

By the time the credits roll, the gimmick gives way to something richer: a portrait of devotion under siege by forces we can’t fully name. Leonberg asks us to see horror not just through new eyes, but through new instincts. And Indy—gentle, stubborn, brave—makes a case that one of the year’s most affecting performances belongs to an actor who never knew he was acting. Good Boy may not reinvent the genre, but it reminds us why we crave reinvention in the first place.