A new dawn, happier end for character in ‘Wiener-Dog’

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Greta Gerwig in “Wiener-Dog.” Photo courtesy of IFC Films

by Naomi Pfefferman
22 hours ago

“I grew up with a number of dogs, but none of them lasted very long,” Todd Solondz, one of independent cinema’s most persistent provocateurs, said during a phone conversation from New York.

The canines would die or run away or simply disappear, courtesy of his parents, only to be replaced by a new (and perhaps less challenging) pooch. “The result, for a child, is that mortality impresses itself upon you and shapes your experience,” Solondz said. “And this is rooted in the inspiration for my new film.”

In Solondz’s new movie, “Wiener-Dog,” the doomed, titular dachshund is passed from owner to owner, forming a series of four vignettes that spotlight the human preoccupation with death. The pooch first lands in the home of a loving boy, Remi, who is recovering from a serious illness, as his parents bicker and resent caring for the canine. When the dog becomes severely ill, Remi’s parents seek to euthanize it, but instead, it is stolen and adopted by a compassionate veterinary technician, Dawn Wiener (Greta Gerwig), an adult version of the mercilessly bullied child protagonist of Solondz’s searing 1995 film, “Welcome to the Dollhouse.”

Eventually the dog comes to be owned by Dave Schmerz (Danny DeVito), a failed independent filmmaker and professor with ultimately violent inclinations, and then, finally, by a bitter elderly woman (Ellen Burstyn) whose granddaughter (Zosia Mamet) comes to visit, seeking cash.

Solondz grew up in a kosher home in New Jersey and attended an Orthodox yeshiva, but he eventually became, in his words, a “devout atheist.” His branch of Judaism, as well, taught that there was no heaven or hell: “I’ve lived my life knowing that this is the one life, so you want to do the best you can with what you have, as opposed to making a ‘down payment’ on what comes in an afterlife,” he said.

http://www.jewishjournal.com/the_ticket/item/a_new_dawn_happier_end_for_character_in_wiener_dog