Watch Canine, the film that revealed Yorgos Lanthimos, streaming for free

For the release of Poor Creatures, the mk2 Curiosity platform is offering this black comedy which won an award at Cannes in 2009.

Yorgos Lanthimos has made four films in English: The Lobster, Killing of the sacred deer, The Favorite And Poor creatures, released Wednesday in French theaters. But it is in his native language that the Greek director signed the first half of his unique filmography, notably with Caninethe film that launched his career.

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Presented at the Cannes Film Festival in 2009, this absurd psychological drama won the Un Certain Regard Prize there before being nominated for an Oscar for best foreign film in 2010. In 2012, David Lynch described the film as “fantasy comedy” in an interview. This is undoubtedly the best approach to discover this work, which is otherwise very disturbing.

Canine tells the story of a family who lives cloistered in their villa. The three children (a boy and two girls), although young adults, suffer the alienation of their father (with the complicity of the mother), who prohibits them from going out and educates them, even trains them, very strangely. They will only be allowed to go outside if they lose a… canine tooth.

The children are convinced that they have a brother who lives on the other side of the fence and are punished or rewarded depending on their behavior by their father. He brings one of his factory employees into the house to satisfy the son’s sexual urges. The latter refusing to perform cunnilingus on her, she obtains one from the older girl in exchange for a headband. Later, she would introduce films into the home (Rocky And Jaws).

Recalling the surrealism of Luis Buñuel and The Castle of Purity by Arturo Ripstein, Canine is a dark and nightmarish fable about manipulation and the excesses of an overprotective education supposed to spare children from the cruelty of the outside world. A radical film which introduced international critics and the public to the stylized and provocative cinema of Lanthimos, which has now become a reference at major festivals and award ceremonies.

Poor creaturesher rereading of the Frankenstein myth, a feminist version with Emma Stone, won the Golden Lion at the last Venice Film Festival and is among the favorites for the Oscars, which will reveal their nominations this Wednesday.

Canine can be seen streaming for free on mk2 Curiosity until January 25