Metacritic reviews

Pet isn’t much more than a twist on an old conceit, and the character beats are painted with overly broad strokes, but it’s sharply shot with a crystalline sense of unease, and Monaghan and Solo lean into their creepy performances wholeheartedly.

The film is engrossing, thanks to the director’s skill at delivering sustained tension, and the excellent performances.

Once past a first reel which deliberately sticks to torture porn conventions, Pet is redeemed by a series of developments that take the film into surprising story and character areas.

As hard as Pet tries to be something different, it still feels like a film about a woman in a dog cage.

The pace is patient, the acting solid and the special effects emphasize craft over flash as the characters rejigger our perceptions from one scene to the next.

Pet is scariest when exploiting our social fears of being rejected, and at its worst when playing some psychological switcheroo in a Saw-like basement.

The screenplay quickly loses this moral clarity as the plot twists pile up and the power balances shift.

In a movie year in which I’ve had to see both “Clown” and “Trash Fire,” the bar for worst of year is pretty low. I suppose that Pet, for me at least, completes a trifecta of sorts.