A father buys a dachshund, or Wiener dog, to his son recovering from cancer, hoping the pooch will fill the void his wife (Julie Delpy) and him can’t fill. The boy accidentally gets his new companion ill, which results in a visit to the veterinarian. The dog will be saved by Dawn (Greta Gerwig), a vet technician, who becomes its new owner by a twist of fate. Dawn is a lonely girl and when she bumps into an old high school classmate, a stoner named Brandon (Kieran Culkin), she accepts going on a road trip with him. From that point on, the dachshund will have many owners: a couple with Down syndrome, a deadbeat screenwriter (Danny DeVito) teaching at a film school where he is mocked by his students, and a bad-tempered and lonely grandmother (Ellen Burstyn). All these characters are part of a mosaic that director Todd Solondz created to present his usual bleak panorama and put together a wacky black comedy filled with ludicrous protagonists.
 
Solondz is one the most well-known and singular filmmakers of American indie cinema. His early work includes two indie classics of the 90’s: Welcome to the Dollhouse and Happiness. In his following films, Storytelling, Palindromes, Life During Wartime and Dark Horse (which, unfortunately, has yet to be released in Spain), the filmmaker continues to make fun of his characters with brutal and cynical humour. With Wiener-Dog, a portmanteau film featuring a stellar cast, Solondz stays true to his style. The film won both the Jury Prize and the Revelations Prize at the Deauville Film Festival, and it was presented at renowned festivals such as Sundance, Seattle and San Sebastián.
 
2016: Deauville Film Festival – Jury Price
2016: Sundance Film Festival
2016: San Francisco Film Festival
2016: Seattle Film Festival
2016: San Sebastián Film Festival