“Let's Not Go to the Dogs Tonight” Review: A Stunning Adaptation

Alexandra Fuller’s 2001 bestseller about growing up in Africa is so cinematic, full of personal drama and political upheaval against a vivid landscape, that it’s a wonder it’s never been made into a movie. But it was worth the wait for Embeth Davidtz’s eloquent adaptation, which charts a childhood vision of the civil war that created the country of Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia, a change the girl’s white colonial parents strenuously opposed.

Davidtz, known as an actress (Schindler's Listamong many others), directs and writes the screenplay for We're not going to the dogs tonight and plays Fuller’s sad, alcoholic mother. Or, really, co-stars, because the entire film rests on the small shoulders and extraordinary, down-to-earth performance of Lexi Venter, who was only 7 when the film, her first, was made. It’s a bold risk to put so much weight on a child’s work, but like so many of Davidtz’s choices here, it also proves astute.

Another smart decision is to focus intensely on a period of Fuller's childhood. We're not going to the dogs tonight is set in 1980, just before and during the elections that would bring the country's black majority to power. Bobo, as Fuller was called, is a ragged boy with a perpetually dirty face and unkempt hair, who is sometimes seen riding a motorbike or sneaking a smoke. He runs around the family farm, whose unkempt appearance and dusty soil tell of a hard existence. The film was shot in South Africa, and Willie Nel's cinematography, with a dazzling, brilliant light, suggests the burning sensation of the sun.

Much of the story is told through Bobo’s narration, Venter’s natural voice and, in another bold and effective choice, her point of view. Davidtz’s script deftly lets us hear and see the racism that surrounds the child and the ideas she innocently picked up from her parents. And we recognize the emotional toll of war, even when Bobo doesn’t. She often mentions terrorists, saying she’s afraid to go to the bathroom alone at night in case one is waiting for her “with a knife or a gun or a spear.” She keeps an eye out for them as she drives into town in the family car with an armed convoy. “The Africans turned into terrorists and that’s how the war started,” she explains, parroting what she’s heard.

At one point, the convoy glides past a wealthy white neighborhood. That glimpse helps Davidtz situate the Fullers, putting their assumptions of privilege into context. Bobo has absorbed those notions without entirely losing his innocence. Referring to the family’s servants, his narrator says that Sarah (Zikhona Bali) and Jacob (Fumani N. Shilubana) live on the farm and that “Africans don’t have last names.” Bobo adores Sarah and the stories she tells about her culture, but Bobo also feels he can boss Sarah around.

Venter is striking throughout. In close-up, she looks wide-eyed and awestruck when she goes to visit her grandfather, who has apparently had a stroke. At another point, she says of her mother, “Mama says she'd mistake us all for a horse and her dogs.” When she says, after a brief pause, “But I know she wouldn't,” her tone is not one of defiant disbelief or childish conviction, as one might have expected. It's more nuanced, with a hint of sadness that suggests a realization just beyond her youthful grasp. Davidtz certainly had a lot to do with this, and his editor, Nicholas Contaras, has cut all of Bobo's scenes to a perfectly crisp length. Still, Venter's work here recalls Anna Paquin, who won an Oscar as a child star for her completely believable role as a girl who sees more than she knows in The piano.

The largely South African cast displays the same naturalism as Venter, creating a consistent tone. Rob Van Vuuren plays Bobo’s father, who is sometimes away fighting, and Anina Hope Reed is his older sister. Bali and Shilubana are particularly impressive as Sarah and Jacob, their performances suggesting a resistance to white rule that the characters can’t always express out loud.

Davidtz has a more conspicuous role as Nicola Fuller. (The film doesn’t explain the title, which comes from the early 20th-century writer A.P. Herbert’s quip, “Let’s not go dog hunting tonight, because Mama will be there.”) Once, Nicola shoots a snake in the kitchen and calmly leaves, ordering Jacob to bring her tea. More often, Bobo watches her mother wander the house or sit on the porch in an alcoholic haze. But when her voiceover tells us about her drowned little sister, we understand the pain behind Nicola’s depression. And as stubborn as she is, we understand her anger and discomfort when the election results make her feel like she’s about to lose the country she calls home. Davidtz does have a scene at a neighborhood dance that goes on a little too long, but it’s a rare sequence that pulls it off.

There are other Fuller memoirs that could be the source of other adaptations. It is hard to imagine that there are any more beautifully crafted than these.