If you squint really hard at this film you can just barely make out the impression of a story that might have made a mediocre episode of the old TV shows "Touched by an Angel" or "Highway to Heaven". You have to squint really hard because writer/director Paul Duran's paint-by-numbers approach to plotting, soap opera-ish dialog and zombified direction has sucked all the comedy, drama and intelligence out of this production like an atomic powered vacuum cleaner. This movie is so flat, it practically folds in on itself to exist in a dimension with neither depth nor height. Duran is a disaster as a storyteller, but perhaps he has a future in mono-dimensional physics.
Jerry (Will Stewart) is the best dressed and best coiffed homeless guy in Los Angeles. He has two homeless buddies; a drug dealer named Mones (Tony Todd) and a vagrant mechanic named K.C. (Cress Williams). After reluctantly helping an old lady (Carol Gustafson) who faints on the street, Jerry gets hired by her daughter (Stepfanie Kramer) to be the old lady's dogwalker and totally untrained nursemaid. Since it offers him a place to sleep other than his broken down car, Jerry accepts. His first idea is for he and his buddies to rob the old lady one evening, but find she's playing bridge with her equally aged friends. Somehow, the senior citizens and gutter scum become bosom companions. Oh, Jerry also has sex with the old lady's daughter and gets tempted and teased by her Lolita of a granddaughter (Nicki Aycox). Some stupid plotting leads to some terrible overacting and Jerry's new life falls apart. Then the old lady dies, which somehow leads to Jerry getting another chance at a better life and then that falls apart within about 3 minutes. The end.
As I mentioned, you can sorta see the basics of a feel good story about second chances and transgenerational friendship crawling through the desert that is The Dogwalker. However, even that meager outline dies of thirst and exposure before the film is halfway over. There is neither a drop of humor to sustain these characters nor any dramatic structure in which they can shelter. I'm not sure I've ever seen anything quite like this before. I've watched a lot of movies that have tried and failed, both miserably and spectacularly. Here, it's like writer/director Duran isn't even trying, as though he was forced to make this film against his will and feebly offered up the most half-hearted effort imaginable to fulfill his required task. None of these characters are appealing. Nothing that happens in the story is interesting. There is no point or moral to the story. There's just nothing here.
That's epitomized by the performance of Will Stewart as Jerry. Now, it is possible that Stewart isn't as vacuous an actor as he appears to be in this film. Perhaps his director simply told him to play the character as a stoic douchebag and Stewart followed those instructions to the letter. It's either that or Stewart just plain sucks. I'm leaning toward sucks because I'd be shocked if Paul Duran knew what the word stoic means.
The Dogwalker is a long, boring slog that leads to empty disappointment. It's not even entertainingly bad, merely thin, lifeless and dull. Only aesthetic masochists should bother with this movie.
Jerry (Will Stewart) is the best dressed and best coiffed homeless guy in Los Angeles. He has two homeless buddies; a drug dealer named Mones (Tony Todd) and a vagrant mechanic named K.C. (Cress Williams). After reluctantly helping an old lady (Carol Gustafson) who faints on the street, Jerry gets hired by her daughter (Stepfanie Kramer) to be the old lady's dogwalker and totally untrained nursemaid. Since it offers him a place to sleep other than his broken down car, Jerry accepts. His first idea is for he and his buddies to rob the old lady one evening, but find she's playing bridge with her equally aged friends. Somehow, the senior citizens and gutter scum become bosom companions. Oh, Jerry also has sex with the old lady's daughter and gets tempted and teased by her Lolita of a granddaughter (Nicki Aycox). Some stupid plotting leads to some terrible overacting and Jerry's new life falls apart. Then the old lady dies, which somehow leads to Jerry getting another chance at a better life and then that falls apart within about 3 minutes. The end.
As I mentioned, you can sorta see the basics of a feel good story about second chances and transgenerational friendship crawling through the desert that is The Dogwalker. However, even that meager outline dies of thirst and exposure before the film is halfway over. There is neither a drop of humor to sustain these characters nor any dramatic structure in which they can shelter. I'm not sure I've ever seen anything quite like this before. I've watched a lot of movies that have tried and failed, both miserably and spectacularly. Here, it's like writer/director Duran isn't even trying, as though he was forced to make this film against his will and feebly offered up the most half-hearted effort imaginable to fulfill his required task. None of these characters are appealing. Nothing that happens in the story is interesting. There is no point or moral to the story. There's just nothing here.
That's epitomized by the performance of Will Stewart as Jerry. Now, it is possible that Stewart isn't as vacuous an actor as he appears to be in this film. Perhaps his director simply told him to play the character as a stoic douchebag and Stewart followed those instructions to the letter. It's either that or Stewart just plain sucks. I'm leaning toward sucks because I'd be shocked if Paul Duran knew what the word stoic means.
The Dogwalker is a long, boring slog that leads to empty disappointment. It's not even entertainingly bad, merely thin, lifeless and dull. Only aesthetic masochists should bother with this movie.