SXSW Film Festival 2025 Interviews For GOOD BOY

At this year’s SXSW there was one movie that brought together dog lovers and horror fans: Good Boy. This ghost story from the point of view of a dog was something unseen before. Film Inquiry was able to speak with the writer/director Ben Leonberg, his partner and producer Kari Fischer and of course, the star himself: Indy!

This is Kristy Strouse with Film Inquiry. I loved the movie and thought it was very creative, something I had never seen before.

Ben Leonberg: Thank you!

So tell us about its origins, you co-wrote the project, right?

Ben Leonberg: I wrote it with my friend and running partner, Alex cannon. We’ve been working on it for a really long time. I guess. To boil it down to, where did the idea come from? In the most concise way possible is maybe the 100th time I watch poltergeist. If you remember the beginning of that film, it’s the golden retriever wandering around the house, and he clearly knows about the haunting before anybody else. And I thought somebody should make a movie from that dog’s perspective. That coupled with, I feel like every dog owners has either wondered or worried why their dog was at one point barking at nothing or staring at an empty corner. You know, that’s kind of the the engine that or question, I guess that powers this whole movie.

I love that. And I’ve actually had that same thought watching poltergeist many times. And I also am just so happy that dog makes it. Also, I have been spoiling people have asked me about this movie. I’m like, yes, the dog is okay. A lot of people, that is such a big thing.

Ben Leonberg: We see that a lot. Does the dog make it? I’m so worried, you know, yes.

Indy is so cute, how old is he?

Ben Leonberg: So Indy is eight years old.

He knows he’s cute too. Look at him. So, did you notice something with him, like he was observing something that wasn’t there? What made you decide to cast your dog?

Ben Leonberg: So when we first started writing the film, the idea was that we were gonna work with a another dog, like a, you know, a real theater dog, professional, like the dog that comes like when they’re not making whatever the next everybody movie is, they’d be making this. But then, as I was writing it and figuring out how the story would work, just because we really wanted the film to be just from his perspective, not rely on human dialog, that the dog would be more realistic, we were making these kind of proof of concepts to try out that idea. And because we had a backyard and we had our dog, we started filming them with Indy. And I think it was like the third film we made. We entered in a short film contest, which it ended up winning, and he got a specially recognized what was it? He was nominated for Best he was nominated for Best Actor. I love that, which is a tough beat for years, but at that point it was, it was like, we have to, we have to make it with him. And then is the other part of your question about, was there anything we noticed about him that, believe me, this first, yeah, because he’s looking all over, I’m wondering how many ghosts are in here. So this what you’re seeing here. [Points to Indy’s curious look] So this is, this is on the intensity scale of Jack Nicholson 1000 yard stare. And I don’t know what zero is, but this is in the middle. We noticed that before he would get his dinner or his breakfast, he had the most intense, unblinking stare, and he would just look at us like, essentially being like, it’s dinner time, don’t you know? And that as a since, like, kind of a storytelling tool that you would have a dog looking very, very intently, you know, we put a camera in between us and Him, and then have shots from of his subjectivity really made the whole thing work. That, you know, shot of dog, reverse shot of what he sees, and kind of your imagination fills in the rest, right?

I love that. And so you’re a producer, and also mommy to indie. When you first heard of the idea, how did you feel? 

Kari Fischer: I was incredibly excited. So my background is not actually in filmmaking. I’m a scientist.

Very Cool, do you believe in ghosts?

Kari Fischer: I mean, maybe after living with him. [Laughs] After developing the film and we won the short film award, that was really the engine that allowed us to even be able to think about making it, just because that came with some nice perks to it that were really helpful. But essentially, you know, we were moving ahead with making the film in Queens, and then the pandemic hit, and so then we ended up in a house in the country, in New Jersey, where it became clear that the way that we could make this film, effectively, was for us to be the ones that are essentially on set with Indy, interacting with him, just because he knows us, He loves us. He’s most comfortable with us. And so that’s kind of how it started, and then Ben has literally given me a producing textbook, the next morning and I picked it up from there.

And did you ever. Have any worries about using indie like, how he would react to how difficult it would be, you know, the having a child star?

Ben Leonberg and Kari Fischer at SXSW

Ben Leonberg: We are kind of living that now. I mean, we’re about to see his ego totally inflated, but absolutely, I mean, and we followed, you know, essentially the rules in the industry are like dogs working just a few hours a day, not like there’s a reason they say don’t work with kids or animals, just because, practically, it’s so time intensive to do so, because there’s such a short window that there you can work with them, that even that they’re affected. His attention span is obviously not that of a person’s. So we really built the production around his schedule, both embracing the things that we could train him to do, but then other things we couldn’t train him to do, but are just kind of things a dog naturally does. You can’t really teach a dog to, on command, fall asleep, or on command, go under my legs and be like, excitedly pet by me. That’s just like, something he does. And like, it’s more just like, how can we figure out how to put the cameras there, which takes a lot of time. And yeah, you know, is a lot of it’s the whole movie was problem solving, but it was built around his schedule, yeah, essentially to make him as comfortable, happy and excited to do it as possible. And we truly let him, be him.

Did you have anyone else come in and help train?

Ben Leonberg: We originally worked with a trainer before we knew we were going to be making the movie with him, and we like to say it’s right, maybe advanced obedience, like he can walk on the heel, pretty good, off leash, so like that. I guess I don’t know, as a dog owner, I don’t know where does that rank in terms of basic or fundamental obedience. It’s pretty good. But we he’s really been trained to be our best friend. Is what he’s what he’s done. It’s all dogs are trained for them, yeah. And so you said you kind of let him be, you know. So were you just filming a lot? Was there a lot of camera on where you didn’t use any of it because you wanted that perfect, you know, moment. Time was the most important resource in making this movie. There were not really that many ways that you could have made this go faster and still get the performance we were looking for.

But yeah, so we filmed for over 400 days for just actually about three years. And those days are just sometimes a few hours at a time. Some of those days, you know, are completely a bust, you know, because, yeah, the thing we plan to do, and he will do some days it worked great. He did exactly that. Other days, it didn’t work at all and it wasn’t usable. Other days, you know, he would do kind of like a third option. Then it was say, okay, he couldn’t do what we originally planned, but he did this other really thing. Let’s change all the storyboards and say this is his new first position, and we’re gonna go from here and embrace this thing that is natural, that he’s doing that’s really, really cool,

You kind of have to embrace the unpredictability of a dog, right?

Ben Leonberg: Yes, and the story itself really did not change in terms of the narrative, what happens, but like, the specific blocking, some of the way the scares work, and like, you know, certainly like the not action in the sense of, like a fight scene, but like, the action had to play out based on his own limitations. But then also features, you know, there’s a lot of things we discovered while we were making the movie that were like, Oh, wow, that’s great. I didn’t know he could do that. My co writer, Alex, frequently got phone calls, which were more frequently the Hey, remember how we planned the, you know, second sequence of the third act was going to work. Turns out it’s going to be a little bit different. And sometimes that was, you know, a headache, and sometimes it was great. This is gonna be easier than we thought.

I’d be curious to hear more about how you filmed some of those scenes because you can truly feel his apprehension, Indy is a great actor! Were you kind of always standing there and directing him where to look?

Ben Leonberg: In a way yes. There’s no CGI in the movie, in the sense that he’s all real. It’s all him. But there’s a lot of tricks that we’re doing to, essentially, you know, set up a shot and composite it so it looks like he’s staring intently at an empty corner, which happened several times throughout the movie. Frequently, the way that would work is that either you or I is in front of the camera while the camera is rolling, talking and speaking to Indy, giving him commands to, like, walk to a mark. And they were saying, Whoa, to get him to, like, pause and halt, and then sometimes saying something really silly, just like hamburger, french fries, neon sign. And he’s like, what does that mean? So it’s not apprehension. Oftentimes it’s, it’s this kind of puzzlement, or like, he’s a dog that’s eager to please. I mean, most retrievers are and they’re, like, trained to be our friends and have jobs. So he learned that the camera meant he was supposed to do something, but he was never quite sure what, because it was always a little bit different. We could certainly give him standard commands like load up, meaning get load up, meaning get up on this thing, sit, stay, roll over. He knows all those kind of tricks, but kind of the once he learned that the camera meant he’s supposed to do something, we were just kind of dialing in through, like, in some cases, stimuli, silly words, commands he doesn’t know to get those, like, kind of quizzical looks. The other part of the effect, though, is that if we were ever on camera, we would then film essentially every scene was shot twice or shot twice where, like once we’re in the frame, and one time when we’re not, and then taking ourselves out. So it’s not CGI in the sense, it’s more of a kind of an old school plating composition technique.

Interesting! It must have it been fun right? To work with your dog?

Kari Fischer: It was, it was a really fun it was a family project. You know, we’re married, he’s our dog. This was a really fun thing to be working on for a long time. It was strange, we used a lot of things that are not normally part of movies. You know, like, there’s a lot of mud in the movie. And, like, Muck. So, like, you know, PhD scientists applying a lot of mud, you know, be a spatula, to all kinds of things.

I’m sure there were lots of baths [laughs]. 

Kari Fischer:  That was the easiest thing to ask him to do.  And I mean, the mud we had him roll around him was far cleaner than his preferred kind of mud!

And it’s a family project, but it’s also something that you get to have forever. And just like anybody who gets immortalized in a film, yeah? I mean, if anyone’s deserving of it, it’s a family dog,

Ben Leonberg: Yes. And, I hope everybody else thinks he’s cute, but I also do hope he feels relatable. That it does seem like the reason we spent so much time getting the performance the way we did is we really wanted it to seem like people who have had dogs before are clicking into that fundamental idea of like, oh yeah. Dogs do look at empty corners. That’s spooky, but the some of the other genuine call it family stuff, like the way I wake up in the morning and he goes back and forth under my legs, that feels real. That’s like, stuff my dog has done before, which I think is both like, really nice and feels good, then also hopefully makes the movie even scarier, because it’s like, Oh, this feels recognizable to something I’ve seen. It’s not a complete other world that I can’t relate to, right? Again, hopefully making it scary.

source: SXSW Film Festival

I think it’s definitely relatable. I think everybody has had that. And something that I find interesting too, and I was thinking about after seeing it- the choice with no dialog etc, animals are unlike humans in the sense that we are talking all the time. They don’t have all this noise of life, you know? So it may be easier to pick up on the supernatural. I guess my question is, do you believe there is something there?

Ben Leonberg: That is such a good question. As a horror fan, I feel like, you know, I’m so torn on it, and I feel like existing in between, I can’t quite make sense of it. I guess the answer is yes, but, analytically, no, I don’t think I believe in ghosts. But in the same token… there are so many things we can’t explain. As much as I tell myself I don’t believe in ghosts, I’m still deeply affected by horror movies and they certainly convince me that I believe in ghosts. I don’t know if that’s much of an answer, [Laughs] but that’s how I certainly feel. I always want to believe in ghosts. Yeah, it would be a better world if, if we knew for sure, there were ghosts, right?

Yeah! [Looks at Kari] Are you a horror fan?

Kari Fischer: I am not.

Did this movie scare you when you watched it back?

Kari Fischer: Well, no but only because I was so involved in the making of the movie. I think you’ve [looks at Ben] said many times that making horror movies is actually not scary.

Ben Leonberg: No and people say horror and comedy is actually very similar in terms of the way you would use shots and that, having sets up and expectations, a twist and punch line. That’s kind of how both horror and comedy works. The difference is, when you make a comedy, people will genuinely laugh on set. Nobody screams while making a horror film. It’s actually very profoundly strange. Something scary happens, and everyone’s like crickets. Hopefully this works in the edit. But yeah, we do overlap on horror, on a few things. We both are big fans of period pieces, and like Jane Eyre, is a deeply scary film, like I still get you [looks at Kari] to watch The Turn of the Screw.

That’s interesting and yes, great choices. Any other inspirations? 

Ben Leonberg: I love classic haunted house films, both as a fan, and then also in the DNA of this movie is there. The Fall of the House of Usher was a big one for me. Not so much in the plot, but in the world of this haunted family estate and the characters the rodericks, I think, are convinced there’s something wrong with them which is not so dissimilar from the human characters of this film. It’s obviously, it’s not anchor on pose time. It’s a new world. But I would say that’s the work of Poe, and that story, maybe in particular, I thought I found really influential on how I made the movie. And

Do you see any future projects? A Good Boy 2?

Ben Leonberg: We do have an idea for a Good Boy 2. So yes, for sure, and then definitely working in the genre more. I love horror films. There’s a lot more I want to do with the genre. Other unique ways to get into stories that are kind of classic, the same way that I hope Good boy from its outset, feels like a classic haunted house movie, but totally new because we’re experiencing it through a dog’s eyes. I kind of want to take that approach to a lot of other, sub-genres of horror, and then in the wider world, action/adventure. I love genre filmmaking. It’s not a coincidence that his name is Indy.

You named the dog Indiana! Love it. I can’t wait to see what else you do. And you have mentioned that people have said their dogs had a reaction?

Ben Leonberg: Yeah, I think it’s funny because I told my sound mixer this after we were pretty well into the final mix, that some people had been watching cuts and said “Yeah, our dogs are watching it with us and having an experience. I’ve never seen my dog so focused on the TV before.” I think it’s probably a byproduct of wanting to make things so dog specific, the way we treat the human dialog. There’s scenes where there’s an important conversation happening, and the dogs don’t care about this. “I’m gonna go follow a ghost instead” and we’ll wander into a new scene, and that conversation drifts into the background. And the way that we use the sound effects, the kind of things that he would do would hear that like the creaks in the house, or like a ghostly sound that would really get a dog’s attention. I don’t know if that’s what the real audience dogs are responding to, but I certainly would love that to be the case. It would make our sound mixer, Brian, who’s also a co producer on the film, that would really validate all the hard work he did, because he put a lot into making the sound of this movie really work.

Well it’s fantastic! And hey, maybe you make more movies for dogs. 

Ben Leonberg: [Laughs] Yes, I could do that.

Well thank you again and congratulations!

Film Inquiry wants to thank Ben Leonberg and Kari Fischer for speaking with us.

Good Boy had its premiere at the 2025 SXSW Film Festival.