User reviews

Am I the only one more excited about the presence of Dodie Heath than Jayne Mansfield?

"Dog Eat Dog" follows the backstabbing adventures of a group of thieves. This black and white, foreign production, is probably most notable for the presence of Jayne Mansfield. Her character, "Darlene" is a member of a three member criminal gang. She is both fond of money, clean underwear, and using the expression "crackers".

Cameron Mitchell is the second member of the group, who is nearly dealt out of the game by the third (Ivor Salter). Mistrustful, but still bound by the money, the group takes to the sea to make their getaway, trailed by an opportunistic hotel manger (Aldo Carmada). Stopping at an island, they encounter a strange group in residency there. Greed and madness lead to murder. And the money becomes a ridiculous fashion accessory.

Not a great deal of depth, to this B movie, but OK for some late evening intrigue and suspense.

The first hour or so of this film seems to be one of those barely competent Euro-thrillers that smells of "deal" and little more.

Evil killers laugh for 20 minutes at a time, a thug in a car tries to kill a pedestrian thug and the editing makes no sense, a voluptuous babe offers to sell out the entire male cast sequentially and all at once, we've all seen it a thousand times and on our own deathbeds we'll undoubtedly regret the time we wasted doing so.

Then the picture goes off the rails, perhaps because of the three or maybe four directors. All pretense of continuity goes out the window, scars disappear and reappear on faces, characters die for silly reasons or no reason at all; basically staging and dialog disintegrate completely. We watch the film go around and around in ever-diminishing circles and finally disappear up its own backside.

You think, "Oh, the poor actors," as they all get that haunted look, like "How did I ever get involved with this mess?" and "Who do I have to sleep with to get OFF of this picture?" and "Boy, will I murder my agent when I get back home!" and "Oh wow, I really need to go; I'll bet it's that schnitzel last night at the hotel."

Jayne Mansfield does some of the best acting in the film, which'll give you some idea of what to expect. When Cameron Mitchell goes berserk and starts ripping up the furniture, he does it with a remarkably rehearsed air, along the lines of "We only have one sofa, so I have to get it right on the first take," and "Does Stuart Whitman have to put up with this stuff in his movies?"

There is no psychological or sociological subtext to this film; it has no stylistic elegance or directorial signature hidden in a overlooked "B"; it is simply a desperate and cynical attempt to make money. The movie fails on every level. You don't even get to see Dubrovnik. Skip it.

In one of her last films Jayne Mansfield probably signed on to do this film for the price of a ticket to Europe to film Dog Eat Dog on a nice plush Mediterranean island in Yugoslavia. Other than a tax write off I can't see any other reason for appearing in this trash.

Jayne's the moll of gangster Ivor Salter who has just pulled off a robbery of US currency traded by tourists for European denominations and has further attempted to dump partner Cameron Mitchell. Mitchell gets tossed off a cliff, but he lives and is out for revenge.

They all wind up fleeing the authorities on some resort island where the guests and management of the hotel are all a bit flaky, but not flaky enough to not want a cut of the loot, or all of the loot. Then people start getting very dead.

I'm curious about the reaction to the film, people seem either to think this is great avant garde cinema or like me they think it trash. I can't see any great entertainment value here. Not even color cinematography which is a must in the Mediterranean.

I'm wondering why Werner Peters was dubbed, his thick Teutonic accent is part of his persona. Normally playing Nazis, Peters here is a musician and companion to the crazy lady who runs the hotel. Why he wasn't speaking in his normal accent is beyond me. He speaks a concise English in other and better films.

In fact everybody here has appeared in something way much better than Dog Eat Dog.

This film begins with Jayne Mansfield rolling about in bed with money all over her. This seems to go on and on and on, as the only reason for the scene is to see this starlet in various states of undress. The film doesn't even pretend to be anything other than an exploitation film at the beginning--and it's obvious they only two things going for the film are hidden under Ms. Mansfield's towel.

This is the story, believe it or not, of "Mr. and Mrs. Smithopolous" staying in a resort in the Mediterranean. Of course these are aliases, as it's Mansfield and her boyfriend. While she rolls in the dough, her man is busy laughing like a hyena while he's killing off his partner in crime. It seems that they have just robbed a shipment of old US dollars that are being returned to the States to be burned and Mansfield's beau doesn't want to split it with his partner. Eventually, the three end up on a supposedly deserted island--which turns out to have several people waiting. There, they wait until the coast clears...and one by one, people in this group start dying off mysteriously.

The plot and action is VERY claustrophobic, as they spend almost all the film on this tiny island and this is bad because the actors are left trying to support the weight of the film. And, considering how bad the actors are, this is a chore they simply aren't up to. Cameron Mitchell basically spends the movie threatening and screaming while Ms. Mansfield does a great imitation of a brain-damaged bimbo (inexplicably, she claimed in real life to be a genius--this film will surely erase all doubts as to her intelligence or lack thereof).

A skimpy plot and lousy acting--it's pretty obvious that this is a grade-C project from start to finish. Why some of the reviewers here on IMDb scored this one so high is beyond me. Stupid and dull.

I've just seen this! It was oddly compelling. My partner gave up on it in the first half hour, but I just HAD to see it all of the way through! As others have said, it's about three thieves on the run after stealing money that was to be sent back to the USA for destruction. What a strange yet wonderful film. It was obviously made towards the end of Jayne's career, as her star was falling...but she acts as if she was still on the A-List! But it's bottom of the barrel-ness makes it (and her performance) all the more interesting!

The movie starts off slowly, but once the thieves make an open sea break for it (with hostage in tow) and end up on a kooky island estate run by a demented older woman, things really shift gears and it becomes very (unintentionally) avant garde!

In this movie you get a way-past-her-prime Jayne doing her own thing (she truly seems to be in her own world while chaos reigns around her), an older woman with a few screws loose, a mysterious killer offing everyone one by one, Cameron Mitchell who never takes the time to wash off the blood and grime that is all over his face, a balding, monocled butler who looks like he's from a 2nd rate (3rd rate?) touring company of "SUNSET BOULEVARD", and did I mention Jayne? See Jayne dance! See Jayne in a cat fight! See Jayne roll around in her undies on a bed full of money! See Jayne in constant heat! See a hefty Jayne run wild on a strange island in nothing but a feather trimmed negligee, a black eye, and extremely bad hair! Just so strange! WOW!

I got this movie on a cheapy double bill (the mind-numbingly awful "SHE DEMONS" is the second feature) DVD. I sought it out just for "DOG EAT DOG", and I was NOT let down (the DVD was ultra cheap anyway...). I just wish someone out there would RESTORE this movie. It's wild and I think it could develop a cult following! NOT for everyone--but take a chance!

God, this movie annoyed me. To be insulting: it's stupid, idiotic, dumb, drags, bad acting, unexciting despite the situation, just a pain to sit thru. I made myself sit thru it because I got 30 minutes into it. What's on the positive side? A few decent lines in the script and the European setting. I cannot believe people give it ten stars.

This movie was okay. I saw it about a year ago real late at night. I only watched it because "THE JAYNE MANSFIELD" was in it. She is so beautiful. The kind of person you just want to have sit in front of you and stare at all day to study each feature. The movie lacked interest though. If you are a Jayne fan, see it. If you are looking for a good movie to watch, don't see it. 1-10 (4) Jayne 1-10 (10) Z.

This 1960's oddity is a rare blend of pulp noir dialogue at it's worst, crisp B&W cinematography, snappy jazz score, Jayne Mansfield's round, doughy sex cat routine, Cameron Mitchell sweating and slugging people and every heist gone wrong cliché in the book (plus a little Agatha Christie thrown in for a good measure.) My friends and I were howling at the verbal "jousting" throughout the film and it is just loaded with one strange character after another. If you are expecting a well made taut heist film, rent Kubrick's The Killing - but for a fun, cheesy sixties crime crap in a blender - then this one is a hoot. Released in England with the much more subdued title When Strangers Meet, they slapped the Dog Eat Dog title on it in America and Mansfield died tragically in the now legendarily gruesome car accident. In fact Maynsfield is four months pregnant with future actress Law & Order:SVU's Mariska Haggerty (sp?) while filming this crime romp. There are cat fights, pistol whipping, Yugoslovian bartenders endlessly cleaning glasses, washed up madams, bald pimps and Cameron Mitchell bleeds more than any male lead in history (and Tim Roth was in an ENSEMBLE when he did all his marvelous bleeding in Resorvoir Dogs). Jayne Mansfield says a lot of unintentionally bad dialogue but her exclamation of "Crackers!" takes the cake...or the crackers...whatever.

What we have here, if you can believe it, is a chimera of film noir, early Russ Meyer, and a Ten Little Indians adaptation.

The plot is verging on parody in its simplicity. Two crooks and a floozy (Jayne Mansfield), somewhere in the eastern Med, steal a million dollars (yes a million dollars exactly!) from a navy vessel transporting used $1000(?!) bills to be destroyed. The robbery isn't shown, which is all to the good really, as I don't really think there was a Peckinpah type amongst the four guys apparently at the helm. In point of fact though it's never the robbery that's interesting is it? That's why I hate heist movies that concentrate on the plan and the safe-cracking, the interesting bit is always the squabbling over the loot.

The crooks end up on a sailing boat on the way to a deserted island which houses a disused palatial brothel. They pick up a couple of greedy stragglers on the way (the eavesdropping hotelier Livio and his incest-fixated yet frigid sister). On the island a motor boat has been stashed somewhere for the getaway, but Corbett (the crook who has the gun) doesn't know where it is, nor where the petrol is hidden.

Anyway the brothel has a woman and her manservant in residence, these two they broke the mould after making. The manservant is a cod-philosopher gypsy-talking henchman type, whilst the woman is an elderly ex-madame who has returned to the island "in order to die". She thinks she is the Empress of the island and is always talking about the Emperor, whoever that might be, she is mentally fragile to say the least.

It becomes a Ten Little Indians style mêlée after the cash goes missing. People are dropping like flies, and we don't know why. Corbett sums up the mood perfectly: "Where da party at? No dough, enough stiffs for a graveyard, no way out, nobody knows who's next and nobody knows who's doin' it" It's a nice movie to look at because it's set on an Aegean island, with a pretty mansion, fluted columns, palm trees, flora, sunshine. There's a lot of luridness here too. Jayne Mansfield's nymphomaniac character Darlene can't seem to stop mentioning that she wants a fresh pair of panties, that she is on her last pair. There's jazz music all the way through, just so we know we're at a party.

One user described this movie as unintentionally avant-garde, well I'd go along with that. This is the stuff that cults are made of. You wont believe the ending by and by.

All of the critical scorn directed at Dog Eat Dog is rather perplexing, since it's a tense, starkly photographed, bleak and sleazy shot of cool 60s crime melodrama.

Dog Eat Dog is similar in its strange look and feel to Roman Polanski's Cul-de-Sac (there's even a bald creep who resembles Donald Pleasence), but with a more straightforward hard boiled edge and noirish dialogue, with Cameron Mitchell cynically dubbing Jayne Mansfield's breasts her "double indemnity".

Shot in beautiful locations and full of interesting, unusual faces, this is a crazy winner that ought to please fans of Mitchell, Mansfield, or offbeat genre films and black comedies generally. Mitchell even gets to go nuts and tear apart a whorehouse, yelling incoherently about money and gasoline. Really, what could be better?

This film had all the elements of a film gone wrong:an international cast,standard heist plot,Euro pop/jazz soundtrack,ham handed action and Jayne Mansfield. Could any film project have been more predestined to be awful?

I was expecting so much worse. Imagine the surprise of discovering how much fun this movie was with all of it's sorry bits working together in some sort of obtuse harmony.

The dialog is over the top outrageous. Check these three prizes just from the trailer:

"Crackers, it's just mad money"....

"You are rude dirty and ugly. We do not cater to rude,dirty,ugly men. Get out."

Or better yet: Madame Benoit:"Where did you get this stuff? It's dishwater." Bartender: "It's the prunes, Madame.Since Socialism they don't let the peasants crush them with their feet any more. It impairs the flavor." Madame Benoit: "It's still dishwater."

And those are just a few of a beginning to end feast of howlers. How could one not love dialog like this ? It's so absurd it's almost genius.

To think Arthur Miller worked so hard on "The Misfits".I will have to watch the film again just to catch all the gems.

And yet: Jayne Mansfield was never again more natural, seeming to have dispensed with the "Divoon" Marilyn parody and almost playing it straight.

It could be the dubbing that made her seem more part of an ensemble rather than a running gag. Someone else dubbed her voice.It works and the dubbing is very well done for a 60s Euro film, everything is in harmony.

It's an awful film on so many levels, but consistently awful from plot to soundtrack, to dialog. It's a package deal that works on all those levels because of it's awfulness. It's what makes "Dog Eat Dog" fun.

The cast is interesting and watchable, the heavy breathing dialog worthy of John Waters, the euro artiness of it gives it an air of sophistication, even legitimacy that was probably never intended.

An accident of a film: accidentally entertaining. One of those "so bad it's good" films. Perfect for a double bill with Elizabeth Taylor's "The Driver's Seat".

Such a surprise to find it so entertaining as I was definitely expecting to feel depressed after watching Jayne Mansfield in it,as I did with "Las Vegas Hillbillies", "The Fat Spy" and "Single Room Furnished".

Maybe this one was Jayne's last great film. Like Marilyn's "The Misfits".

Would definitely watch it again.

Not a waste of time at all. Definitely worth seeing.

It is a pity that with badly edited bootleg copies, you no longer can enjoy to the full with the witty social criticism, and the psychological analysis of the characters as the original movie was intended to. Even a poor version (I got mine from the WWW as "Dog Eat Dog") you should not miss Jayne's great performance. She was not under the best directors, the richest producers, with the best casts Hollywood could afford - but she was a major personality, and she shows it everywhere: namely here, in this little, wonderful film - dark, so dark, as Jayne's life was going to be. Notable also for Jayne's only fight scene on a boat, and on the seashore, trying to escape a no-escape island.