Title – Good Boy (2025)

Director – Ben Leonberg (feature debut)

Cast – Indy, Shane Jensen, Arielle Friedman

Plot – Loyal dog Indy ventures to an isolated property with his sickly owner Todd (Jensen), where he discovers that they’re not alone in the house they’re staying in.  

“Boy, you can’t save me. You gotta stay here”

Review by Eddie on 05/12/2025

Thrusting he’s own beloved dog Indy into the spotlight for their feature debut Good Boy; director Ben Leonberg is lucky he’s four-legged best mate is such a superstar as otherwise this uniquely designed horror outing is left wanting in all other areas.

Clocking in just over the 70-minute mark, this Shudder backed dog POV feature has found itself garnering a fair amount of media attention and public calls for the Academy Awards to finally introduce a category for animal performers thanks to Indy’s standout lead turn but outside of the Indy factor Leonberg struggles to give Good Boy much else in the way of substantial wins.

Following Indy and his owner Todd (played by Shane Jensen) as they venture to Todd’s grandfathers’ remote property for a retreat as Todd deals with a significant illness, Good Boy struggles to give us any new ideas whenever we focus away from the fact this story is delivered as if we are in the very mind of Indy and as a horror/supernatural thriller, Good Boy is scarily bereft of scares or frights.

Filmed for an incredibly meagre $70,000 and already clocking-up millions of dollars at box office tills around the globe, there’s no doubt Leonberg and Shudder are jumping for joy courtesy of Good Boy’s performances that also includes an extremely healthy 90% fresh rating on review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes but you can’t help but feel short-changed by an offering that never manages to match its leading man’s top-notch central performance.

The very definition of the films title, Indy the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever is nothing short of a champion here with Leonberg getting a emotionally laced performance from his furry friend who does a whole lot with his eyes, expressions and body language and had the film around him somehow managed to be more interesting or full of frights and delights, Good Boy may’ve just been one of the most unexpectedly good genre films of the last few years.

Proving there’s still original ways to tell unoriginal stories, Good Boy isn’t a complete failure but one can’t help but escape the feeling there’s a lot of forgiveness from viewers being shown here that usually wouldn’t be seen had the cast been entirely of the human ilk.

Final Say –

Championed by its committed leading canine and showcasing there’s still new ways to deliver familiar set-ups, Good Boy is unique in some ways but is let down majorly by many of its facets, that not even the greatest of good boys can save.

2 unwanted pats out of 5