My Dog Tulip (2009) User Reviews

Not for prudes

[roedyg · 6/10 · 6 May 2013]

At first this film looks like a short for children. It is not. It is a rather lecherous look at dogs. It is not for prudes. The ideas it discusses seem more shocking because of the innocent animations used to present them. I am one of the least prudish people I know, but found this film repeatedly embarrassing. It seemed unseemly for Christopher Plummer to be relishing such gross things as vomit, diarrhoea, bowel movements, urination, masturbating dogs, getting turned on by dog genitalia, zoophilia, leching over dog breeding, dog erections, tight dog foreskins, and dog behaviour in heat.

It is naughtily amusing by periodically putting a dress on the animated dog Tulip, and has her behave with dog-like motivations but as a human. This makes clear just how different dog behaviour is from human.

The "kindly" old man behaves in ways that belie his gentle voice. He allows his dog to bite children, to bark at all hours, to attack people and poop on other people's property then not clean it up. He does not spay his dog then beats all the dogs attracted. He lets his dog have puppies just so he can derive some perverted pleasure from the birth before drowning them. This clashes drastically with the charming animation which is like entering a painting.

The musical score is rendered with extraordinary crispness. Its cheery oompah band is used rarely to punctuate the story. It is very well done.

The big problem with the film is its deceptiveness. It so very different from what you would expect, you feel tricked into participating in some filthy joke. It is not X-rated porn, but it is quite off-colour and the box should let you know to expect that.

I wanted to love this film but...

[bormanator · 7/10 · 22 January 2011]

This story was enjoyable because I too took in two abandoned female dogs. I loved the art work, it reminds me of yellow Submarine. The problem for me was that the owner was a very irresponsible person. He seemed to think it is OK for your dog to make a mess on the sidewalk or anywhere else without cleaning it up. Also, he tried so hard to get Tulip pregnant without a plan for what to do with the puppies. His heart was in the right place, but the pups ended up like Tulip - pretty much throw-aways that he lost track of. Both my girls were spayed at twelve weeks, they led very happy lives without contributing to the excess dog problem. Again, the drawing was minimal but I loved it. Also the soundtrack. Moral of this story - dogs really are mans' best friend!

An obscure animation with a distinctive sketchy style

[Stompgal_87 · 8/10 · 25 August 2013]

As a lover of dogs and animation, I found this film appealing. It is a perfect example that combines the two alongside '101 Dalmatians,' 'Oliver and Company,' 'The Plague Dogs' and pretty much any incarnation of 'Scooby Doo,' although the animation style of this film differs from that of all four of the titles since it has a sketchy if wobbly look. Most of the animation was smooth but jerky on the chickens and the backgrounds were as sketchy as the characters and both had rather subtle colours if the fantasy sequences on paper were plain and simple.

The narrative of this film was engaging and reminiscent of 'Marley and Me.' I liked how Joe's typing or handwriting fitted in with it as well as the fantasy sequences depicting Tulip and other dogs in anthropomorphic ways on lined or plain sketch paper while the music had an old-fashioned feel that suited the film's style very well. Although some parts of it were crude and disgusting (especially Joe cleaning up Tulip's runny mess in the middle of the night - it nearly made me vomit) and risqué (no wonder it's a UK 12 rating), I was touched by the unlikely relationship of Joe and Tulip. Although she was a live-wire and seemed to be more interested in his sister Nancy, he still loved her. Parts of the film reminded me of when my parents owned a dog themselves such as Tulip dragging her bottom on the floor with her hind legs in the air (probably what dogs do when they need to relieve themselves) and going on heat since I observed Jasmine (my parents' Cavalier King Charles spaniel that they acquired in 2008 but was sadly returned to her breeder in 2011) dragging her bottom on the floor and my dad suggesting she needed a wee as well as her moments of going on heat. While the pace of the film was pretty slow until Tulip had her puppies, it was at this point that it became rushed because it seemed like little or no time between the birth of Tulip's puppies and her death (mentioned but not seen: only depicted as her fading away and returning as an anthropomorphic spirit). I like the fact that this film was dedicated to Lynn Redgrave since it was her final film before her unfortunate passing.

All in all this is an obscure yet distinctively-animated film that has its blend of crude, risqué and touching moments and is easier to follow than 'The Plague Dogs'. 8/10.

If you are (or intend to be) owned by a dog don't miss it!

[pairslife · 8 January 2011]

An utterly charming and delightful film which provides a mostly joyful and honest perspective on the trials and tribulations of being owned bya dog. The mores and geography of a time and place from England's recent past are portrayed from a middle- class perspective, with very effective attention to detail. You'll leave wanting to get home right away to your canine, and give him/her a reminder of how much you care.

The graphic styles are a great fit for the setting and the sentiments of the story. We left curious about the book's author, and wondering how he fared after the end of the period covered in the film. The last few years of Tulip's life get little-to-no coverage in the film, which short-changes the audience a little. The dog's youth is engagingly well covered, it would have been even more of a delight to get some rich visual story-telling about Tulip's middle- and old-age.

"My Dog Tulip" is an absolute gem!

[wtwomey-1 · 10/10 · 21 August 2010]

I have been dying to see this film since I first heard about it over a year ago and finally saw it, and, not only did it live up to my very high expectations - it surpassed them!

Based on the classic book, "My Dog Tulip" by J.R. Ackerley, this film is an absolute treat from start to finish. It's an animated film and every frame is a work of art. It was hand-drawn but not on paper - it's the first film to be drawn on a tablet and over 100,000 drawings were made. You can almost feel the love and devotion that went into this touching story.

It's about a lonely man, who, quite by chance, acquires a German Shepherd dog, who turns out to be the love of his life! I'm sure anyone who has ever loved a dog will enjoy this story. However, just because it's animated doesn't mean it's aimed at children. Quite the contrary - it's definitely for adults as much of the movie involves Ackerley's frustrated attempts to find a mate for Tulip.

If you're a dog-lover, an artist, or just someone who appreciates a good film, do yourself a favour and go see this wonderfully unique film! I can't wait to see it again!

"Constant, single-hearted, incorruptible, uncritical devotion."

[StevePulaski · 9/10 · 11 May 2011]

A dog is a man's best friend. And sometimes a dog can substitute a woman in a man's life. My Dog Tulip was a book written in 1956 by the English writer J.R. Ackerley about how he rescued a female dog named Tulip from an abusive home. Tulip went on to give J.R. the best fifteen years of his life, and quite possibly the best thing in Tulip's life was J.R. Both had instant chemistry and expressed a strong love for each other. Coming from a cat lover, My Dog Tulip was beautiful in every category.

The animation was not CGI, it was hand drawn on a tablet which wound up to be over 100,000 still drawings. I've never seen a film done like this and I've never seen a film quite like this. The animation is scratchy, but it manages to capture the beauty even without it being polished and glorified. It doesn't need to be. It is a complete throwback, and if it would've been made with CGI it would ruin the film.

J.R. Ackerley was an openly gay man and often expressed that he was in his writings. He admitted he was after his parents died because of the time period he grew up in where being gay was the absolute worst thing that could've happened to you. Thankfully it isn't like that now. J.R. never found the right partner, but told us in the movie and in the novel My Dog Tulip that it was Tulip who served as his mate.

Tulip's behavior would become increasingly protective when another woman came to see J.R., mainly his sister Nancy, Tulip would bark uncontrollably and demand undivided attention from him. She didn't like J.R. with other women. Tulip wanted J.R. to be his only.

My Dog Tulip could easily be mistaken as a movie for a young child. One between the ages of four and nine. It is not. The film is totally geared towards adults, or understanding adolescents. It is equipped with dry British humor and a very soft spoken voice. The narrator is always calm, even at the most tense of times.

The film deals with topics like love and the menstrual cycle of dogs. It is something many children will not get or even be interested in. They will just want to see the doggy.

Compared to a film like Marley & Me, My Dog Tulip holds up a lot better most likely because it is true and not a work of realistic fiction. Marley & Me was nice at showing how bad a dog can be, but My Dog Tulip shows how good and sweet a dog can be to a human. Two totally different films, that are both nicely done in their own way.

We all know what happens at the end, it isn't suspenseful. Tulip grows old and dies at fifteen after giving birth to several puppies. Tulip's story is very sweet and soft, even at it's saddest. J.R. died at the age of seventy in 1967. His spirit will continue to live on in his books and this heartwarming and caring film. Easily overlooked for the animation category in the 2010 Academy Awards.

NOTE: My Dog Tulip was actress Lynn Redgrave's final performance before passing away on May 2, 2010. R.I.P.

Starring: Christopher Plummer and Lynn Redgrave. Directed by: Paul Fierlinger.

Dog lovers might appreciate this but not me.

[valleyjohn · 5/10 · 10 June 2011]

They say , a dog is a man's best friend and I have no doubt this may be the case with some people .

Not with me.

I'm not a dog lover , even though I am a reluctant owner of one.

My Dog Tulip is a strange little animated film that tells the story of a bond between a man and his Alsatian , Tulip.

At first I enjoyed the story telling and relationship he had with this dog but it soon got a bit tedious. There was too much talk of the dogs private parts and it's toilet habits. All this did was confirm my feelings i have about dogs.

The art work is quirky and a lot of it storyboard animation but I still feel that this will only appeal to real dog lovers . If your not , you might struggle to see what all the fuss is with this bloody dog!

"My Love Tulip"

[sterrenmaan · 10/10 · 10 September 2012]

Whenever you come home, feeling a bit lonely or overlooked, and you do not have a dog, this is one of those movies that make you feel warm in your chest and pressed in your throat.

My Dog Tulip is about the loving relationship between a man and his dog, going through the most common circumstances with so much care and affection, that it leads to endless devotion between both and the kind of spotted emotions that we usually call "human", that make you, the viewer, blight and smile.

The animation and the story are both drawn and written so personally, that it detaches itself from other films in the way it reaches you. It also contains so much social reflection and wisdom that is makes a remembrance that is everlasting.

10 out of 10

love the book, but the movie is, for me, a huge failure

[marymorrissey · 2/10 · 30 August 2011]

JR Ackerely is one of my very favorite writers, one of the great stylists of the 20th century and way ahead of his time with his concerns for the homosexual, animal rights etc. Although he didn't think much of himself as a poet he produced a small body of brilliant verse. He also wrote a short play that kicks arse. His use of language and his humor are outstanding as a matter of degree - so funny, so beautiful as impressive as anybody else's work that ever wrote anything, are his books. His bittersweet oddly sympathetic misanthropy, his audacious lack of shame/total honesty are however incomparable/one of a kind. I've read "My Dog Tulip" at least 4 times and it's not my favorite of his works by any means.

First of all, I'm disappointed that the lack of creative imagination in this effort resulted in a script consisting of nothing beyond excerpts simply cut from out the book and strung end to end which are delivered as voice-over to images which despite the not entirely uninteresting style of the drawings, serve merely to illustrate the spoken text in a straightforward/pedestrian manner that serves only to subtract from what the mind's eye would see sitting down with the text.

What horrifies, mystifies and utterly confounds, though, is that a book that is so LOL funny, and so transcendent / touching happy/sad is thus reduced, somehow in the performance, I think, notwithstanding the addition of so much window dressing (which is frankly at its worst perhaps, actually, in the sequences in which it attempts to do a wee bit more than simply depict in 2 dimensions what we're reading flat out - as for example in the sequence in which Tulip marking her territory urinarily is depicted as a kind of ballet dance which I suppos o u g h t to be funny (especially, I suppose, if you find those pfeiffer "here is a dance to..." comic strips to be funny) but simply falls flat as a loose stool), to coming off as no more amusing than it'd be to be stuck listening to some old codger who has absolutely nothing to say but to blab incessantly, humorlessly, without much enthusiasm/verve at all in fact, enough to put you to sleep, if you wanna know the truth, about his beloved pooch (this, of course, a direct result of the reader's digest treatment the book gets in "focusing" it). As an example, his writing about the battle between his sister and Tulip over the territory that is JRA's bedroom is just too hilarious on paper, but on screen it barely elicits a smile from this viewer.

I don't suppose that "My Dog Tulip" was the best subject for film treatment, yet it might have worked beautifully and surely would have played better as a plain old "movie movie" (ie a narrative film/story) than to serve up this ultimately lazy kind of multimedia presentation of 'highlights' resulting in a show and tell snoozefest. I'm sure there actually IS a 3 act drama in there to be divined, written afresh, shot and shown. This movie most assuredly is not it dammit!

Disclaimer - after about an hour I packed it in.

"We Think the World of You" is another film that does an abysmal job taking what his most popular novel offers in the way of dramatic material and turning into a movie. So sad.

I was offended by the toilet humor and smut

[JewessU · 31 October 2011]

I am an artsy, worldly person, but I was creeped out by the ever present toilet humor and the smut, even though it was animated. This movie started out appealing because it was animated, had pleasant music and was set in England. It seemed charming, creative, and well-spoken at first, especially for dog lovers and anglophiles, but it became unpleasant and offensive with graphic animated canine and human sexual functioning and toilet and menstruation humor. It was smutty. You should know this before you watch it in mixed company. It is a definite NO for children and not a date night movie either. I watched the special feature about the making of the film and I am not surprised that it was animated by a middle-aged recluse couple who appear to enjoy what they see as sticking it to middle class values, but it was creepy. And I was horrified by the scene when the main character was preparing to drown puppies. Be forewarned, that just because it is animated does not make it benign or wholesome. It is neither.

Delightful Acccount of Eccentric BBC Writer and High Strung German Sheperd

[martys-7 · 10/10 · 3 February 2013]

When English writer and BBC editor J. R. Ackerley brought home with him a German Shepherd bitch whose owner was in prison, little did he anticipate how difficult would be to care for her. However, despite the fact that Queenie (the original dog's name) was untrained and high strung demanding his full-time attention, he felt unconditionally loved for the first time in his life.

This is a delightful animated movie for adults and older children based on Ackerley's memoir of the same name. Each individual frame was digitally painted with broad brush strokes creating a minimalistic and naturalistic scenes. Tulip is shown acting like a dog when she is taken to the veterinarian, runs out of control in the park, or goes into heat. And life-long bachelor Ackerley used to his peace and quiet is challenged by each one of Tulip's behaviors or problems. This is a movie about unconditional love that dog and animal lovers, or for that matter anybody who has had real feelings for any creature, should treasure.

To understand the origin of Queenie, see the very good comedy drama "We Think the World of You" with Gary Oldman and Alan Bates, based on Ackerley's novel of the same name. It tells how an incarcerated burglar's dog becomes the object of class warfare between his working class wife and parents, who mistreat the dog, and a middle class former boyfriend.

Life and times of Tulip

[elizabethjsmith66 · 10/10 · 13 December 2012]

I usually would not watch any film that was animated but because the book MyDog Tulip was so enjoyable I decided to give it a try. I'm so very glad I did. The art work is brilliant. My Dog Tulip is not in any way cartoon-like and is not for children, It is very faithful to the book. If you have never lived in England especially during the period covered in the book I would think you might not connect with the film because it is so very British. A lot of Americans might be put off due to this but I found it was one of the pleasant things about it, having lived in England for a few years. Also the author's companionship with his Alsatian (German Shepherd) dog was really heart warming. I also had an Alsatian and could relate to a lot of the things in the film concerning the problems he encountered trying to find a suitable mate for his dog and also the encounter Tulip had with the chickens could have come directly out of my notebook. I enjoyed this film for its artwork, story and British humor. I will definitely watch it again. Tulip could have been a twin for my dog.

DIsappointing and NOT a family film!

[LilyDaleLady · 2/10 · 25 July 2012]

I've given two stars for the charming, freehand-style animation -- very enjoyable and unlike Disney or Pixar. The film has a handmade, European look to it and often very pleasing. I understand it was drawn in some kind of computer animation based on drawings, but it looks like it was hand-rendered.

I had such high hopes for this film; it's about a dog and I'm a dog lover...I'm a HUGE sucker for any sort of sentimental dog story. Alas, this is more of a cynical and very odd memoir about a German shepherd female ("Alsatian bitch" in the UK lingo) who is owned by a curmudgeonly old writer, J.R. Ackerley. I have not read the book, but from my understanding the film is faithful to it.

Why odd? because Ackerley is a pretty strange dog owner, obsessed with his dog's bowel and bladder habits and almost nothing else. We don't learn too much about why he wanted a dog, or what Tulip's personality was like, or even many funny anecdotes about her life with him -- but fully 2/3rs of the film seem to be musings on her bladder and bowel habits, plus animation of the same.

At least 1/3 of the film is about Ackerley's rather unpleasant attempts to breed Tulip, with a lot more information than anyone wants to know. This makes the film 100% unsuitable for young children, and probably awkward even for older children. You also wonder what else was wrong with Ackerley's life that he didn't concentrate on his own relationships (he admits upfront to being lonely and isolated) to the point he obsessed over his DOG'S sex life.

Eventually, Tulip gets impregnated by a rough stray in the neighborhood ("Lady and The Tramp"?) and has a litter of 8 puppies, at which Ackerley seems gobsmacked that he actually has to deal with the results of the breeding he pursued so avidly -- apparently without the slightest plan for taking care of the puppies! Indeed, he is shown preparing to DROWN Tulip's puppies! UGH! I was warned off this from other reviews, but imagine going into this COLD; it utterly destroys any sense that he loved or cared for this dog. He seems heartless. What kind of person could DROWN a whole litter of puppies? (Note: he had a vet, and could have euthanized the puppies or even aborted the pregnancy.)

There is also a odd problem with the timeline; supposedly Ackerley, born in 1896, adopted 18 month old Tulip when he was "well over 50". That would make it the 1940s -- when the war and wartime deprivation was ongoing. Yet it isn't mentioned AT ALL. In fact the film suggests it is taking place in the 60s or 70s, or even more recently.

The book was published in 1956, when Ackerley was 60 and Tulip passed on. That means the most recently he could have had her was roughly 1948 (she lived to 16), but probably it was earlier even than that. No matter how you do the numbers, if she died at 16 but BEFORE 1956, then Ackerley had to be younger than 50 when he got her.

Also, Ackerley is depicted as if he was nigh onto 80, a frail elderly man. That could not have been close to true until the very end of Tulip's life -- which is not remotely shown. The story about her basically ends after her puppies are rather heartlessly given away (no small wonder, as they were "mutts" and not purebred German shepherds! at least they were not DROWNED!). We are simply told "after that, she lived to 16" (a very old age for any dog 60 years ago).

The tone of the film is just terribly odd, with strange ramblings, like a fantasy about some fellow dog owners (whose male dog is selected to be bred with Tulip), and how Ackerley imagines them as naked. Frankly, I just don't get the whole "obsessed with sex" theme mixed with "my wonderful old dog" theme. It is awkward, unpleasant, not very well handled and of course, it makes what otherwise might have been a delightful story of a man whose life was wonderfully filled with the love of a good dog into a bit of a peep show. Too bad.

(Note: the real Tulip was named "Queenie"....why change her name? It's not like she's going to sue.)

A perfect film.

[jcmcgee · 10/10 · 19 February 2014]

This film is perfect.

The story is lovely, the music fits brilliantly, the animation, especially in the way. with a few lines and a little colour, it catches the "character" of the dogs is incredible in it's simple perfection.

I came to England (from Scotland) and fell in love with the place thanks to H.E. Bates' books...this little film reminded me so much of them....it's very restrained in it's beauty, summed up by the first line: "In being quite unable to love each other, the Englishmen turn to their dogs"

Why did this film not sweep the Oscars? No other animation comes close...apart from perhaps "Mary & Max".

Everything about it is perfect.

What a lazy, soulless movie adaptation

[taylorguidotti · 2/10 · 23 August 2021]

More than anything, this film is lazy. There is no continuity between animation styles, often switching randomly from coloured and established frames and terrible sketches that morphed in shape and form. There is no pattern to what is meant to be "completed" and it took the appearance that the filmmakers only animated the scenes they wanted to. It gave me a headache more than anything else.

As someone with a reactive and sometimes difficult dog, the cavalier attitude of the narrator was exhausting. Tulip is rarely on the leash, the owner details the "unfairness" when others tell him to clean up the poop, and he doesn't do anything to even try to control the dog, insisting that she needs a chance to prove she has intelligence (I'm sorry but this logic is so flawed, if you have an aggressive dog you anticipate that.) The amount of toilet humor is absurd. I'd rather have been watching Shrek for the constant poop jokes.

How they took a funny, witty, and charming book about the love or an owner and his dog and turned it into this lazy, heartless, bleak adaption is beyond me. Such a disappointment.

Scientific, cold and lacking heart when it proposes to be about the relationship between owner and dog

[bob the moo · 24 July 2013]

Although the film is specifically about a relationship between an older man and a dog, I think that the relationship with pets is reasonably universal. OK there are obvious differences between the dynamics of having a dog and those of having a lizard but generally the nature of the affection and the relationship is similar in most cases. I say this as someone who had a dog for about 8 years and now own 2 cats and for all the animals they became a part of my life to the point I could not imagine being without them and did tend to treat them with an affection that they probably don't deserve as mere animals. Anyway, all this rambling is by way of saying that I was open to this capturing this relationship even if it was not specifically the one I had experienced.

And I genuinely didn't expect the relationship to be like my experiences but somehow I wished they had at least been vaguely similar because as it was I really got no sense of this affection until it is spelt out in the narration in the closing few moments. Up till this point the material is incredibly detached from emotions and almost scientific in its removed observation of Tulip. The film is remarkably crude in its contemplation of her ablutions, her period in heat and so on; I really felt quite confused by this as I was not sure what to take from it. There seemed to very little that was heartfelt or about a sense of companionship in the way I would see it – for the majority of the film Tulip came over as almost an insect in a jar.

The animation is refreshingly rough and personal – there is more heart in this than in the actual material. Unfortunately the animation amplifies the crudity of the film, showing the biological obsessions of Ackerley and it frequently gives the film even more of a sordid feel. Plummer's narration is nicely warm and if there is an hint of affection in the material then his voice brings it out – shame there isn't much to be had.

A really disappointing film then; it proposes to be about the relationship between a man and his dog but presents something that is roundly scientific, cold and lacks any sense of heart or feeling. The animation both helps it be better and also be weaker in different ways.