Dogs Don't Wear Pants

Dogs Don't Wear Pants
Theatrical release poster
Finnish	Koirat eivät käytä housuja
Directed by	[de; fi]
Written by	J-P Valkeapää Juhana Lumme
Produced by	Aleksi Bardy Helen Vinogradov
Starring	Pekka Strang Krista Kosonen Ilona Huhta Jani Volanen Oona Airola Iiris Anttila Ester Geislerová
Cinematography	Pietari Peltola
Edited by	Mervi Junkkonen
Music by	Michal Nejtek
Production companies	Helsinki-filmi Tasse Film
Distributed by	SF Film Finland
Release dates	21 May 2019 (2019-05-21) (Cannes ) 1 November  2019 (2019-11-01) (Finland)
Running time	105 minutes
Country	Finland
Language	Finnish

Dogs Don't Wear Pants (Finnish: Koirat eivät käytä housuja) is a 2019 Finnish erotic black comedy^[1] film directed by  [de; fi]. It was screened in the Directors' Fortnight section at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival.^[2][3]

Plot[]

Seven years after his wife tragically drowned, widower Juha finds himself emotionally distant as he raises his daughter Elli alone. He uses a dress and perfume belonging to his wife to get aroused. When a chance encounter with Mona, a dominatrix, brings him closer than ever before to feeling something again, he finds himself entering the world of BDSM. He enjoys being asphyxiated as this causes him to have hallucinations of being under water with his wife. His initial encounter appears non-consensual and we see little negotiation between the two. However, the dominatrix gives him a ball to hold when strangling him, so if he starts to lose consciousness the ball will drop and she will know to stop. He gives the woman his wife's dress and perfume to wear.

Juha walks away from his work (at a hospital as a surgeon) smashing a door when his pass card fails to work. He fails to go to his daughter's concert in favour of seeing the dominatrix. He tricks the dominatrix into continuing the asphyxiation for too long and he passes out. She gives first aid and calls an ambulance (in her other life she is a physiotherapist so has medical training). It seems possible he wanted to die whilst seeing his dead wife.

Juha's daughter arrives at the hospital, distressed. Her father says he 'saw her' and tells her to get out. Later he has to wear a neck brace. A work colleague tells him the Board is concerned about his behaviour and want to do a psych evaluation on him. Whilst this conversation takes place Juha pulls his own damaged thumb nail off!

Juha keeps calling the dominatrix but she refuses his calls. She inadvertently burns her hands and when the tattoo artist - whose building she shares - gives her salve, she is asked wouldn't she rather do something ordinary some of the time. She says no.

Juha stalks the woman but has pepper spray sprayed in his face. Later he takes his daughter's music teacher out to dinner and gives her his wife's perfume. They end up at her place and have sex. He asks her to wear the perfume and strangle him. She goes along with this but also finds it funny.

Juha follows the dominatrix once more, this time to her flat. They talk and he offers her a trade: she can hurt him as much as she likes, no safe word, but then she must strangle him. She agrees and he follows her upstairs on all fours. She ties him up and says she will pull out a tooth. He refuses but then says yes. She pulls out a tooth after some struggle. Next she wraps his face in cling film. Finally, she realises that he 'came here to kill yourself'. She frees him and starts sobbing. Juha comforts her. They kiss. He slaps her and she doesn't return the slap. She shuts herself in another room and he leaves.

But she comes back with the dress he gave her. Meantime, Juha has returned home where his daughter is absent. He finds Elli in a park, smoking, and invites her to the Natural History Museum (like they used to do on her birthday). He says he's met a nice lady and then Elli goes off on her boyfriend's moped.

Juha hears that his psych evaluation came back clear and he tells his colleague he lied. Later he goes to a BDSM club and sits at the bar. He drinks a cocktail and looks happy. He gets on the dance floor and then 'his' dominatrix walks in. He grins and she smiles back.

Cast[]

• Pekka Strang as Juha
• Krista Kosonen as Mona
• Ilona Huhta as Elli
• Jani Volanen as Pauli
•  [fi] as Satu
• Iiris Anttila as Lävistäjä
• Ester Geislerová as Vaimo

Reception[]

On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 90% based on 30 reviews, with an average rating of 7.5/10. The website's critics consensus reads: "Dogs Don't Wear Pants will be too intense for many viewers, but for those who can take the punishment, there's pleasure in this stark drama's pain."^[4]

References[]

External links[]

• Dogs Don't Wear Pants at IMDb
• Dogs Don't Wear Pants at Elonet (in Finnish)