Who Killed Rover? is the weirdest dog movie you will see this week

If you have about fifteen minutes and want to feel like you are hallucinating, you should watch this. It is basically a noir mystery but every single actor is a dog. Not cartoon dogs, but real dogs standing on their hind legs wearing tiny suits.

People who like weird history or old-school surrealism will probably get a kick out of it. If you find the idea of dogs being forced to act like humans creepy, you should stay far away. It is definitely not for everyone.

The whole thing is part of the Dogville Comedies series. They were made by Zion Myers and Jules White back in the early thirties. I cannot imagine how much patience it took to get these dogs to stay in their little chairs.

The plot is actually pretty standard for a mystery. A wealthy old dog dies and leaves everything to his nephew. Then the jealous relatives decide to kidnap the poor guy. Enter Phido Vance, the great detective.

One of the first things you notice is the voice acting. It is very high-pitched and screechy. It sounds like they are trying to talk through their noses the whole time. It gets a bit grating after the first five minutes.

There is this one scene in a bedroom where a dog is lying in bed. He has a little nightcap on his head. The way his ears poke out of the hat is honestly the funniest thing in the movie. It looks so uncomfortable but he just sits there.

The sets are tiny too. Everything is built to dog-scale. They have little desks, little telephones, and even tiny cigars. I saw a dog "smoking" a cigar and I had to pause the video to make sure I saw it right.

Sometimes the dogs just stare directly at the camera with this blank look. You can tell they are just waiting for someone off-camera to give them a treat. It breaks the illusion, but the illusion was already pretty thin to begin with.

It is way different than something like Smilin' Through which came out around the same era. That one is a serious drama. This is... well, it is dogs in pants.

The detective, Phido Vance, wears a trench coat. It fits him surprisingly well. He walks into a room and you can almost feel the movie trying to be serious. But then he wags his tail and the noir vibe is totally gone.

The "villain" dogs are great too. They have these dark patches over their eyes to make them look mean. One of them keeps baring his teeth. I think he was just thirsty, but it works for the character.

Cinematic perspective: Exploring the visual vocabulary of Who Killed Rover? (1930) through its definitive frames.

I wondered if the dogs actually liked doing this. Probably not. Some of the movements look a bit stiff, like they are being held up by wires or something. It makes the whole thing feel a little uncanny.

The kidnapping scene is pure chaos. There is a lot of barking. The subtitles help, but the barking is really the main soundtrack. It is much louder than the music in The Blues, that's for sure.

I liked the little details in the office. There is a typewriter that a dog actually puts his paws on. He isn't typing, obviously. He is just hitting random keys, but the editing makes it look like he's writing a report.

The pacing is actually pretty fast. It doesn't overstay its welcome. If it were an hour long, I would have turned it off. At fifteen minutes, it is just the right amount of bizarre.

There is a chase scene at the end. Dogs running after a car. But the dogs are inside the car too. Seeing a dog's paws on a steering wheel is something I won't forget soon.

The movie ends exactly how you think it would. Justice is served, I guess. The nephew is saved and the bad dogs get what's coming to them. It is very simple storytelling.

I watched this right after seeing Felix Crosses the Crooks. It was a very strange double feature. One is a cartoon, and the other is... whatever this is.

Is it a good movie? Not really. The acting is literal animal behavior. But as a piece of film history, it is fascinating. It shows how much people in 1930 loved a good gimmick.

One shot of a dog drinking out of a tiny teacup lingers way too long. It starts to feel like the director just forgot to yell cut. The dog looks confused. I was confused too.

I think I enjoyed the absurdity more than the story. The mystery isn't really a mystery if you are just looking at the dogs' outfits the whole time. I spent ten minutes wondering how they got the hats to stay on.

Things I noticed:

• The detective's hat is tilted at a very stylish angle.
• One of the "damsel" dogs has a very fancy wig.
• The phone keeps ringing but nobody has fingers to pick it up.
• There is a lot of sniffing that clearly wasn't in the script.

If you find this on a streaming site or YouTube, give it a look. It is a weird relic. It reminds me of the strange energy in His Royal Highness, but with more fur.

Don't expect a masterpiece. Just expect dogs. Lots and lots of dogs in human clothes. It is weirdly memorable even if it is kind of bad. 🐾