You are on your own. Nothing happens to men like us because we live from day to day, ”a Chechen immigrant tells homeless Syrian children in Istanbul. StrayedRootless, nomadic hand-to-mouth existence is central to director / producer / editor / cinematographer Elizabeth Lo’s documentary, but humans are just the peripheral players in this stunning non-fiction research, which really focuses its gaze on some of the myriad canines that roam the city streets. A spiritual addition to Ceyda Torun’s 2016 Cat (which related to the legions of cats living in the same metropolis), Lo’s film reveals the secret lives of dogs. In doing so, she draws strong parallels between their world and ours, and our shared desires for food, comfort and companionship.
After a 20th century when authorities tried to exterminate the animals (leading to mass killings), widespread protests have turned the city into one of the few places on the planet where it is illegal to euthanize and imprison stray dogs – meaning that at virtually any sidewalk, in every alley and near every dumpster, dogs congregate in search of food, spar, sniff and try to survive. Theirs is an unromantic plight, albeit not without its pleasures, and Lo’s camera takes their perspective everywhere, maintaining a low position as they follow these puppies back and forth, across busy sidewalks where people barely notice them, across streets where cars stop to let them pass, and on beaches where they can run, play and roll freely and occasionally twists and grunts at unknown intruders.
Strayed turns his attention to a trio of dogs – starting with Zeytin, whose striking tan and large, sad eyes are as expressive as her movements through Istanbul’s various districts are casual. With a sometimes cross-eyed expression on her face and a right ear that hangs slightly lower than her left ear, Zeytin is an indigenous inhabitant of this urban landscape, equally comfortable on its well-paved sidewalks, in its parks along busy passageways, and on jagged stretches of hilly land. decorated with gigantic rock outcroppings and ruins of buildings whose columns still stand. Zeytin is confident that makes her a perfect guide to this area and also makes her popular with the locals, many of whom know her by name. That includes a collection of young Syrian migrants living on the streets and, as we learn from random snippets of conversations, they are known to smell glue and are under constant threat of arrest by the authorities.
Zeytin is quickly linked Strayed with friendly Nazar and black and white pup Kartal, the latter of whom is in the care of Syrian children after begging a local man for one of his many stray animals, and he agrees by telling them that they can return at night and steal one for themselves. The similarities between the dog and refugee populations in Istanbul are not difficult to discern, and director Lo does not italicize or force such echoes, but instead let them emerge from the ongoing proceedings. Through the careful selection and juxtaposition of scenes, she analogues the struggle of animals and children for survival, their territorial quarrels with others (be they other dogs, or tourists and police who prefer to keep the streets clear of homeless youth), and their longing for love – or, at the very least, a warm body to snuggle with under a blanket at night.
Lo distributes her film with textual quotes about the nobility of dogs (mostly from the Greek philosopher Diogenes, circa 300 BC), but shuns open comment otherwise. Even the human voices come in Strayed are heard only in fragments, and sometimes through distorted audio designed to mimic how Zeytin, Nazar and Kartal might experience them. Those bits and pieces of dialogue are sometimes comical (like comments about two dogs fucking during a women’s rights march), sometimes political (like when men argue about whether or not to vote for the Nationalist Movement Party), and sometimes as common as a garbage truck. operator who punished Nazar for not sharing a meat bone found in the trash can with Zeytin. Such commentary is generally background, but it nonetheless remains an important part of Lo’s observational investigation of the urgent concerns, rifts and treatment of those living on the margins of Turkish society.
Strayed is most suggestive when simply walking alongside or behind the dog’s protagonists, capturing (and subtly mimicking) the movement of their bodies, the rhythm of their gait, the curiosity in their eyes and the possible cruelty of their circumstances – a fact that is conveyed by a beautiful sequence in which Lo’s camera races down a nighttime street after Zeytin, almost losing sight of her, only to have the euphoria of the moment (enhanced by Ali Helnwein’s string score) interrupted by a sudden burst of dog-to-dog violence repressed by Syrian children. At that point, the film recognizes the fine line between bliss and brutality that defines these dogs’ day-to-day situations, as does the sound design (courtesy of Leviathan and Sweet grassErnst Karel) duplicates the swirling combination of sounds – chirping birds, honking horns, disembodied chatter – that engulfs them as they swing from a dilapidated building site to a storefront to a gray shipyard.
INTEGRATE
Lo’s portrayal of these wayward dogs is often melancholic, especially when it comes to Kartal, whose habituation to these hard pounding grounds seems to provoke a considerable amount of trepidation from the look in his eyes. Yet there are also moments of funny frivolity, such as when Zeytin encounters a cat hiding in a row of park shrubs and, suddenly enlivened by this discovery, immediately sets off in pursuit. Strayed does not shy away from good or bad and documents his four-legged subjects as they jump, hump, run, fight, scratch, growl, sleep and seek protection, food and rest. The more she looks at them, the more she taps into the universality of their experience, without losing sight of the uniqueness of their character and predicament.
With perceptive neo-realistic grace, Strayed let the actions of his dogs speak volumes about their resilience and benevolence, their ferocity and their compassion, despite abandonment, neglect and abuse. In addition, the film also says a lot about the men and women who are willing to lend a helping hand to the less fortunate – and also about those who turn a blind eye to needy creatures.