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Far from being a dour, clinical meditation on post apocalyptic life, A Boy and his Dog is a tongue-in-cheek, darkly ironic and shrewdly misogynistic meditation on post-apocalyptic life. This, along with its rather Spartan production values, has earned it some criticism over the years. I find the criticism – mainly regarding the movie's perceived cynicism toward the fairer sex - to be valid but somewhat overstated. While Vick's motives toward women are by no means pure, it should be noted that few 17-year-olds are particularly well refined to begin with. And it is a sad fact that in times of war, when some men feel removed from their moral compass, females caught in the conflict often find their honor at a disadvantage. But part of the point of focusing on such a young man is to question whether or not an individual who has never known honor, morality, sacrifice or penance can ever come to understand these things in the most hostile environment imaginable.

Played by a young Don Johnson (his Sonny Crockett swagger and five o'clock shadow put to good use), we meet Vic in the midst of what appears to be a rescue operation. A young girl is being attacked by a gang of bandits and needs help. At first it seems as though Vick and Blood have come to her rescue, but when they arrive too late we discover that both adventurers have their own selfish motives - and neither involved helping the poor girl. Though gifted with the exclusive ability to read one another's thoughts, Vic and Blood would at first seem to be unlikely companions. Self indulgent, impulsive and heedless, Vic's primary concern – even over food - is satisfying his base, carnal desires. Blood is a hyper intelligent and perpetually hungry pooch who has agreed to use his abilities to seek out women for Vic, while Vic's task is to fend off bandits and find food. The story takes great glee in mining their relationship for comic irony, and it works more often than not. A Boy and his Dog is essentially the story of a pitiable malcontent who craves sex more than food, being led around by a scruffy dog that is too lazy to hunt and too pompous to admit it.

Outwardly, Vic considers himself superior to Blood by virtue of being human, but we come to discover that inside he may be little more than a frightened boy in need of a mentor. Blood parades his intellect as often as possible, but in a world with no more use for poetry or genius, he's as out of place as his teenage companion. And like many kindred souls, they acknowledge their interdependence by playing against one another's weaknesses rather than accentuating one another's strengths. As such it would be easy for either Vic or Blood to use the inhumanity of their every day existence as a convenient excuse to casually spiral into oblivion together. But there's another old saying that says "if you only have one person in the world that you can trust, you have one more than most people." Eventually that aspect of their relationship will be put to the test, and the dog who knows nothing of loyalty and the boy who knows nothing of compassion will learn that these may be the only two things left in the world that matter.

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