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I saw this one several decades ago. When I first saw it, I declared this was the worst movie I had ever watched in my life, but it grew on me. I's now one of my all time favorites.

I have loved this movie ever since I first saw it in a theater over 25 years ago (yes... that long ago!).  I swear there still is no better ending in any sci-fi movie ever made, with the possible exception of "The Sixth Sense."  
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I still remember so vividly sitting in that movie theater as the movie was coming to a close, and hating that conniving b***h of a girl and wishing Vic could just get up the guts to do the unthinkable and save his devoted friend, Blood.  But, of course, that could NEVER happen, right?  But, I thought, what a perfect ending it would have made.  Too bad such a satisfying ending was simply not possible in our civilized culture... right?
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Well... thank heaven for Harlan's very "uncivilized" nature.  Because... DAMN, was that ending ever satisfying...
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...If not in particularly good taste.    ;)
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Just saw the movie today.  It had it's bad points, sure enough, and I thought the underground people were a bit freaky what with their funky face paint and all, but I was entertained thoroughly throughout.  That ending is a classic, though!  That alone was worth the price of admission!

I saw this movie about six years ago in a theater as a double feature with The Man Who Fell To Earth, and ever since it has been my favorite sf movie of all time. It's got it all...Post nuclear wasteland, a telepathic dog, a creepy totalitarian underground Christian based society with happy makeup and farmer clothing, mass insemination, maniacle happy face robot man, and of course an unforgetably awesome ending. Way ahead of it's time. Classic

This movie is actually based on a short story by famed pain-in-the-ass author Harlan Ellison.  You've probably gotten this same exact message a million times, tho.

I take it you've never read the book...though I do agree the movie was not that good

I don't know why you consider this a bad film. It was the inspiration for Road Warrior and the book was hailed as a classic. This film is also hailed as a Sci-Fi classic. I think some of you are jaded by all these eye candy films because A Boy and His Dog rocks!!! If you don't think so, go watch Star Wars for the millionth time and shut the hell up...freaks! Hahaha!

take a soso short story add bad actors bad plot bad scenes bad catering (i dunno) and what do you expect to get? The only person that I cared for in the movie was the girl and she couldnt act either. in other words ..hated the story ...hated the movie...

This remains the only movie I've ever seen that made much less sense when the telepathic dog was not part of the script.

This is not a really bad movie..I remember when it was first issued for theaters and was reviewed by two different critics where I lived (syracuse)  one absolutely hated it, could not understand thing about the film, the other saw some possibilties and said, not bad...

A Boy and His Dog is the best movie ever made.  I am making a site about it right now and i will write back with the address.  

I am back and I have a my site.  http://vampirafiend.tripod.com/a_boy_and_his_dog/
all should go there and mavel in it.  It sucks.  This site is far better, but I am a true lover of A BOY AND HIS DOG so my site will be victorious.  HAHHAHAHA. . . haha

Your review is good as you've given a very good sf movie four slime drops - esteem...

The film is not based on a book, but on Harlan Ellison's short story. H.E. didn't allow his name on the film because of creative problems (anyone familiar with him will understand). One can read the short story and the story behind the film in the book <i>It Came From Hollywood</i>, that also contains the original short stories upon which were based "Death Race 2000," "the Thing," "This Island Earth," "The Day the Earth Stood Still" and others.

When the film came out at the theater I was too young to see R-rated material, but my father, a huge sf fan kind of indicated he wanted to see it, but since he couldn't stand Harlan Ellison I reckon he couldn't bring himself to do it.

Your review was enough to push me over the edge and actually rent the movie. 'Twas time well spent. It's been on TV a couple of times and, well, with censoring and commercial interruptions - click. It's a really great sf film and raises a lot of questions, like "hmmm, what would a post-apocalyptic mid-western USA be like if it was overrun by bands of adolescent boys?" It's an excellent adaptation of a short story and belongs up there with the great sf films that demand study, like "Solaris" and "Gattaca."

A Boy and his Dog was and still is a cult favorite.  It was a movie ahead of it's time and just because there aren't a lot of high tech special effects don't put it down.

The movie is seen as a companion piece to the H.E. penned story and the Illustrated work of Richard Corben(Vic & Blood). The movie lacks in many regards but is superior to other attempts at Sci-Fi cinema such as Star Wars.

AB&HD is missing several key features, actual screamers and the short film that Vic & Blood view in comics version at the theater. Dolphin spinal fluid injected into dogs? Used in a war in South East Asia with flame thrower backpacks and linked via telepathy? Nuclear war survivors so irradiated they can’t die and glow in the dark?  That makes for good science fiction.

Absence of the 82nd Airborne that in the comic and the novella shows a key detail as ammo traders. As hypothesized after a Nuclear War, if any survivors to reap the benefits of a AB&HD or a Road Warrior type wasteland two simple facts are always neglected. There is never enough ammunition to last forever, and secondly gas goes bad after 6 months(just thought I would throw that in) So much for endless fire fights and driving your V8 interceptor with the blower full tilt. In Vic’s case he would need someone to outfit his 8.5mm Belgian 1921 rifle.

The comic as well as the book depicted Topeka as a strew of cinder blocks and craters whereas the move came up short by filming in the desert. Yet creative attempts at showing houses buried by flood or fallout made up for the lack in budget. That fact alone shows creativity.

For all it's short comings, AB&HD should be seen as a cult indi film and never as an attempt to win over a large audience like Star Wars has/had.

How can you not like this film?  Boy gets girl, boy loses girl, boy recovers girl, AND FEEDS HER TO HIS DOG!  YES!  
I recorded this movie off of PBS and I'm glad I did.  No advertisements and no editing(suprising enough).  First and only time I ever saw nudity on PBS(it was 2:00 in the morning may be they figured no one would notice).

I haven't read the actual book by Ellison.But I do have the "Vic & Blood" comic by "Mad Dog Graphics".

Which unlike the movie was a very sad ending.

Their's also a Prequel to the story by Ellison that I do have called "Eggsucker".

Which I highly recommend.Jim

Except for the twist at the end (watch out for the spoiler above), this movie was a confusing mess to me.  I should watch it again sometime to try to sort it out.  Perhaps the version I saw was heavily edited, for the movie makes no sense to me once Don reaches the underground cult.  Jason Robards laughs maniacally and then Don just sorta leaves.  The review on this site states it more clearly than I remember.  Not really cheesy (too grim), not really good (too confusing), just a sort of interesting failure, I guess.

This is one of the great classics of science-fiction filmmaking. It truly captures the Harlan Ellison atmosphere (right up there with the first "Terminator" film). Even though made on a small budget (the mutants are green flashing lights) this movie has the tasty sense of the grotesque that the best science fiction can provide. Who could not like a story where the totalitarian society's loudspeakers broadcast helpful household hints?

ooooh man.
me and some friends were at blockbuster when this movie just sorta poped out at us and screamed "rent me!!"
fortunetly, we did.
and i must say that even though none of us understood anything about it except for the fact that the girl gets eaten at the end........

and that was enough to put this in my top ten list.

this had to be one of the weirdest movies ever. very bizarre and confusing. we couldn't figure out why the people had paint all over their faces or why the dog was telepathic. meh. it was ok. the only reason we rented it was because of the title itself "A Boy and His Dog: a Super Sexual Sci Fi Adventure" how could that not be sick and disgusting? we were thinking some sort of grossness between boy and dog, but alas, it left us confused and annoyed that we wasted our 3 dollars at blockbuster.

One of the best (sickest) post-nuclear nightmare flicks I ever seen. What could be better than a horny teenage Don Johnson walking around the deserts of America with a telepathic dog, helping him get laid? Probably Don's finest moment in acting. I think what would make it worst would be the Moonies running the fall-out shelter instead. I hope my post-nuclear apocolypic life style would be this good.

First saw AB & HD many, many years ago.Enjoyed it then, still like it and it has always amazed me that I have never known a woman who liked the movie.

Well, contrary to one comment above, the catering on the set was very good.  I was an extra in the movie (the drummer in the marching band) and while it was a lot of fun to make I am still not impressed with it.  I do however, own a copy of the film.  One bit of trivia about the picnic scene, if you look closely some of the people at the picnic are also in the marching band and play two people in the same scene.  No trick photography, after the band scenes were shot, some of my friends put on different clothes and were filmed again.

Well, Bob, you have now met the first woman who liked this film.  No, no, no - I LOVED it!  First saw it at a drive-in almost 30 years ago (1975, I think it was), it totally cracked me up. Of course, Don Johnson was major eye candy in those days, which helped, but I have a very twisted sense of humor, too.  My then-boyfriend, now-husband didn't think much of it, but I recently rented it from NetFlix and watched it with our 17-year-old son, who thought it was "weird, but cool." I intend to purchase a copy soon, as I love to watch some of the old cult hits over & over again.
And this one is well worth owning!

Saw it first-run in 1976 and just recently got the DVD.  Hadn't seen it in more then 25 years and it's every bit as good as I remembered.  Quilla is played by Susanne Benton, who had also got nekkid in "That Cold Day in the Park" a few years earlier, but was seldom seen nekkid or otherwise after AB&HD.   Hope she had a good life.  Jason Robards steals the show: "Lack of Respect, Wrong Attitude, Failure to Obey Authority--THE FARM, Immediately!"  I agree it's not exactly a "bad movie," but due to the presence of Don Johnson I won't make a federal case out of it.

Best Wishes.

I first saw this movie in the fall of 75, and I really liked it.  Really a different sort of film for the time. But I will always remember it because of experiencing one of the greatest lays in human history that followed. (and someone said women didn't like the movie).

A must see for any guy who is sick of watching Chick flicks!

To John, that was the extra in the marching band: Where were the underground sequences filmed? I couldn't tell if it was an actual park and church or if they were filmed on Astroturf sets.

Also, as much as I enjoyed the film, I couldn't quite get the bizare behavior of the underground citizens and what the point ws of the clown makeup, unless it was a protectant of the radiation.

This movie is very very very borring and uninteresting film it could of been better.RADIOACTIVE DREAMS was a far better  movie.

This is actually a world-class movie made on a budget. Harlan is certifiable ... and in many respects puts Phil Dick to shame ... but too prickly for Hollywood, so they'll ignore him until they can safely make a buck off him without paying him anything.

And the movies will completely shred his ideas. Wait for it.

I saw this in college in 1988 at the campus theater's Cult Classic series.  Having lived all my life in the American Southwest (which brings so much more presence to Night of the Lepus, Tarantula, and The Island), I was very pleased to see Don Johnson and mutt wandering around my neck of the post-apocalyptic woods.  (Well, desert.)

The underground society was creepy, and I kept wondering how they made such vast open spaces beneath the surface.  You'd think that, after nuclear devastation, such massive excavations would be impossible.  What keeps it all from caving in?

At the college theater they would give away cheap prizes before the cult classic movies.  In this case the prize was a can of Alpo.  I didn't win.

That PBS would show this unedited at anytime is so great I'm going to demand they do it agian at the next pledge drive.

This movie is a classic. That means essential for people who watch films consciously, whatever that amounts to. Many classic films are actually all kinds of bad, but a little contextual rearranging can make them utterly engaging.

Thanks for the chuckling (if short) review.

The absolute worst ending of all time, to a movie that was otherwise pretty good for its genre was Don Johnson’s debut in, “A Boy and His Dog.” 

 

Great plot, especially for the teenager.  (Hey, I was newly married with a lovely wife at my side!)  The end of the world scenario was great, last woman on earth, found by a telepathic dog, the parents “didn’t understand” etc.  Girl rescues guy from certain death because he was stupid enough to follow her into paradise in lust! Great movie!

 

Okay, until THEY EAT THE LAST GIRL ON EARTH????  Who thought that up?  I don’t care if it was in the original!?!!  They FIXED the stupidity of Dumas in The Count of Monte Christo!!!!!   

 

I guess that is why St. George is one of my heroes.  First he did something about the problem, and second, I’ve always believed there were better things to do with girls and than feed them to dragons.  Today, 2 failed marriages later, I still wouldn’t feed any of them to the dog!  Not when a simple pint of blood from either of us would certainly do!!

I juat saw this movie and loved it. On a superficial level it was misogynistic, but not really. The leading female character was far from a bimbo and she certainly deserved what she got at the end, which was very satisfying. A very well done, timeless, hilarious satire. The warped WASP underground society was spot on, especially with the "committee" headquarters being in a creepy (but very authentic) Protestant church basement. 

As a woman I find a movie like Medicine Man (the one with Sean Connery) or the second Indiana Jones (a Kim Basinger clone plays the lead) to be offensive.  This movie was realistic.

I don't think she was the last woman on Earth, just maybe the last hot fertile one in that area.

I kind of got the impression that most of the excavation was supposed to have been done before the war, like these people took over an old secret government instalation or something.

So many people have decided this is a cult movie. I suffered through 2/3rds of it before becoming bored and disgusted and finally turned it off. I am no prude, and consider John Waters Pink Flamingos a work of art, but this movie sucked. As others have pointed out, bad acting, dark cinematography (as in you can't see a thing), a stupid premise, and senseless violence do not a cult movie make. True, some of the scenes here and there were good, but what are we talking about here? Maybe 10 minutes out of the whole movie? Maybe. Later, when I read a review and found out how it ended, I was very happy I bailed out before then. What a stupidly dumb ending! Shock just for the sake of shock I guess. Harlen Ellison is a good writer, but not every story of his works. This one would have been better buried instead of being turned into a very bad film.

This wasn't Don Johnson's first movie, his first role was in "The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart" and he did about 4-5 movies after that before ABAHD, but they didn't go anywhere.

I am a HUGE Don Johnson fan and I was really freaked out by this movie, it has it's moments and parts of the story are genius but I really don't like it at all. I can understand its cult appeal though.

Shortly after it was released, I saw this movie in a drive-in in Florida. Perfect!

I think it's a great movie. If it isn't considered a cult classic, it shoud be. I tried watching V for Vendetta, now that movie just plain sucked.

I am surprised at the lack of "Fallout" references. I mean, there were raiders, mutants (not exactly like the ones in Fallout but still), a crazed underground society, all that was missing was genocidal government agents.

If you mean the Fallout video game series, there are no references because this movie was made 20 or so years before the series existed (and the original story came out years before the movie).  A BOY AND HIS DOG may have been one of the films that inspired the game, though, along with MAD MAX and the other post-apocalyptic movies.

I'm trying to remember any explicit references to A Boy and His Dog in any of the Fallout games, and I can't place any.  Regardless though, the influence A Boy And His Dog had on the late 70s and 80s post-apocalyptic sub-genre is very noticeable, particularly in Mad Max and the Road Warrior.  And those two, of course, were quite significantly influential on the Fallout games.

I enjoyed it and the ending is really great

@references in fallout 3
it's probably hard to tell if its a reference or just coincidence...
- in the trailer for fallout 3 you see a "lone wanderer and his dog"
- the "glowing ones", feral ghouls glowing green
- you start in a vault where a totalitary overseer rules, and when you come back revolution of the younger ones is going on

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/A_Boy_and_His_Dog
in fallout 1 there is a vault city, ruled by a council which controls every aspect of life, pregnancies are strictly scheduled

The entire Fallout universe is heavily based on the universe in "A boy and his dog" -- the war that lasts a very short time, but is otherwise not explained is in Fallout, the vaults of Fallout are pretty much copies of the Underworld (except they have more of a vault feeling, rather than an underground settlement) -- in Fallout 2, pretty much every plot element related to any sites in the movie is present somewhere: Junktown = Phoenix, the Underworld = Vault City + The Farm (a place where people live underground, have a farm and have adapted to the underground life so much as to be unable to return). Screamers = Ghouls (especially glowing ones) and so on.

Please disregard Fallout 3 when finding references to the movie -- F3 is based (loosely) on the original games and the universe is more akin to Fallout Tactics, than the original games (for instance the BoS is a powerfull organization, rather than the gimmick they are in the original and, to a lesser extent, F2).

I've been a big fan of this site for some time, but a question has always nagged at me.  How "random" does a random act have to be, and how "gratuitous" does a gratuitous exposure have to be?  You have the post-coitus exposure listed as "gratuitous", which may be true, but the exposure a few minutes prior when he happens to walk in on her changing her clothes wasn't? 

It's pretty subjective, because we're just talking about the impression it makes on me while I'm watching it.  If someone suddenly destroys something, then that usually comes across to me as a RANDOM ACT OF VIOLENCE.

With the nudity, I tend not to point out every single instance.  Doing that, especially with some films, would make the Stuff to watch for section look like this:

RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
Why does she have a tattoo of a dog?
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
Please, please make them stop singing.
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!
RANDOM GRATUITOUS BREAST SHOT!