Starts off brilliant. We care about the kid. His mother tries to hide the reality of dog spading by telling him something much worse, and it involved going bald which the boy had suffered from. How sick is that beneath the surface? Its good. The boy is a sponge and accepts all around him yet is curious. His dad is both caring for the boy but cold towards the dog. Interesting enough. The dog is locked in small cage in a big house. It's a great environment. The family seem rich so why not build a kennel? The dialogue is psychologically rich.
The problem starts when the dog is in the life of Dawn Weiner. The same Dawn from Welcom To The Dollhouse, which I oike a lot. Here we just don't invest in her. There is no dynamic with the other characters. Worse of all the sombreness is forced on us instead of coming from character development or plot. For example there is a Mexican band who just appear so depressed and just stand about frozen for the purpose of being sad. Why bother? There is no light with the dark. This why Todd Solandz movies with comedy work better. This all seems jolted together. The way Brandon tells his brother about his father's death is ineffective. It should have been an important moment but it's not acted well enough and there is no build up. Some tension before would have been better. It's not even shot well sometimes.
Then an intermission with a running dog to music? Is this movie a parody and I'm missing something? Is it the Littleist Hobo on acid?
Danny Devito's character Dave enters and yep he looks depressed. No suprise. How many movies have struggling script writers in them? It shouldn't bother me but the movie has to win me back at this point. Devito does a decent job playing a guy who wants some recognition so dumbed down his work to see if that worked. A guy who kind of admits he may not be a good writer at heart and has wasted his time trying. This part of the movie seems to dig at writers and film making. Dave is an old style writer with his 'what ifs' for ideas and the new kids are looking for something just edgy and self-absorbed for ego. They dont respect Dave. This part of the movie is OK. Dave's part of the movie ends with a 'then what'? I liked that connection. Cheesy but some fun at least.
The last part has some heartless and selfish characters including an urban artist who claims he's no Damien His yet ends up displayed a dead dog at an exhibition. Maybe a dig at modern art? Nothing relatable or engrossing.

What about the dog in this movie? In the first part we see how he fills an emotional void and has his own relationship with the characters. In the rest he's kind of second place or irrelevant. Some people get upset at the dog being killed. I don't see the issue. People die in movies all the time and nobody cares. Dogs do get run over. It's not a real dog being killed.

Todd is one of the best film makers around (or was) but this isn't a good effort.