Can animals act? Sensible people would say not: Our four-legged friends can’t read a script or construct a character, and if they come across charismatically on screen, that’s simply down to obeying commands, plus the deft touch of an editor. The more whimsically accommodating among us would say those last two points are true of some human actors too; Hitchcock, with his infamous “actors are cattle” quip, suggested as much. Either way, it’s hard to watch Kodi, the ragged, hungry-eyed canine star of “Dog on Trial,” without sensing, whether by sheer good fortune or some mysterious process of empathy, a genuine performance afoot.
Called upon to jump, slump,
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