Rottweiler (2005)

Every culture and religion have their own concept of the afterlife. Heaven and Hell are the most widely known and accepted in Western cultures, though the details might vary slightly. There’s also the reincarnation, where a person lives out another life or continues the life they’ve been living, now on a different plain of existence. Ghosts, demons, and gods abound through the different beliefs. But one thing that has roots in many theories of the afterlife, and doesn’t always get the same recognition as other details, is the concept of the hellhound.

The name hellhound sounds very much like it might come from Christianity, Catholicism, or any of the other Heaven and Hell afterlife religions. And yeah, that might be the case. There are, however, different incarnations of a hellhound-like creature throughout various religions. A demonic type of dog is more common than you might think. It gives people more of a reason to try and be morally virtuous instead of following their basic animal urges and instincts. Hellhounds keep people in check.

There are a few different ways that a hellhound has been represented in folklore. One specific hellhound that might be the most well known is Cerberus, and that isn’t the standard depiction of a hellhound. Cerberus falls more under the guard dog type of hellhound. In Greek mythology, Cerberus was Hades’s dog, tasked with guarding the underworld. The hellhound made sure that the souls of the dead couldn’t escape. It wasn’t even entirely a dog. It had multiple heads and had many serpentine appendages. There was almost as much snake to the creature as there was dog. But it was considered a hound and it guarded the underworld. That’s a hellhound.

The more common depiction of a hellhound is a hunting dog for a demon or the devil. Say someone makes a deal with the devil. Once the deal is complete, and the person got their part of it, the devil might send some hellhounds to get the soul. It might not even be that complicated. The person’s time might just simply be up. They’ll hear hellhounds barking at their door, or any of those other turns of phrase. These demonic dogs will hunt until they’ve killed their prey, and there’s nothing that a person can do to stop them.

That brings us to Rottweiler. Brian Yuzna directed the horror film in 2004 for a 2005 DVD release in the USA. Dante (William Miller) was a man on the run. He escaped a convict life to try and reunite with his girlfriend or fiancé or wife who he had been torn away from. All the while, there was a resurrected rottweiler chasing him and killing everyone in its wake. It was the hellhound on his trail and it wouldn’t stop until he was dead.

The movie began with Dante as a convict. He had illegally entered Spain and was arrested for it. He and the man he was chained up to broke free of the guards when another prisoner was stung by a scorpion. They were immediately pursued by a guard as well as the titular rottweiler. The first bit of the chase ended with the rottweiler catching the two escaped convicts and killing Dante’s partner. Dante managed to escape, but soon ended up in the hands of the guard who was hunting him.

Technically, the rottweiler was a resurrected prison guard dog, brought back to life through cybernetics and other robotic equipment. It’s not a typical hellhound. But it still had the same sort of intentions as a hellhound. The rottweiler would stop at nothing to catch Dante. It was out for the kill. If anyone got in the way, as Dante’s criminal partner did, the rottweiler would kill them. That would continue throughout the hour and a half runtime.

The next sequence in the film had someone capturing Dante. He was captured in a cave by one of the guards from the prison. The rottweiler showed up, so Dante stole the guard’s gun and shot the rottweiler in the head. He then shot the guard and fled. That wouldn’t stop the hellhoundish rottweiler, though. It would quickly recover from the headshot and pursue Dante to his next hiding place, causing more terror and death.

Dante attempted to find some help and encountered a mother and daughter. They took him in and everything was going fine until the rottweiler showed up again. It killed the family’s dogs then went after the mother. Dante and the mother managed to protect the daughter. The mother got killed, but Dante trapped the rottweiler and escaped to relative safety with the daughter. This trap didn’t keep the rottweiler at bay for long. It escaped and continued its pursuit.

The rottweiler followed Dante to a seedy red light district area of a nearby city. Dante was still looking for his wife/fiancé/girlfriend and ended up searching through a brothel. The guy who led him there was shacking up with one of the prostitutes when the rottweiler came in and killed them. Dante managed to escape with his life once again, after realizing that the woman he was trying to find wasn’t there.

This might seem like a summary of the movie, which, for the most part, it is. There were a good many details left out in the summary to not give away the whole story. What mattered most was the pursuit of Dante by the rottweiler. The amount of locations and time spent in the chase was what made the rottweiler seem like more than a simple hunting dog. It was much more like a hellhound in its dedication. It had been killed and resurrected during the pursuit. It killed a great many people as it tried to get to Dante. It was going for the kill of one man and would stop at nothing to get it.

Rottweiler was a good example of a hellhound in popular, or not so popular, media. It might not have outright been a hellhound, but it shared many of the traits. It was a dog-like creature. Everywhere that Dante went, it was chasing him. It was always barking at whatever door he was hiding behind. It would stop at nothing to get him because someone sent it to take his life. The warden of the prison, who sent the dog after Dante, was the devil. The rottweiler was the hellhound. Dante was the man whose time was up. His soul would belong to the devil, no matter what the cost.

The legend of the hellhound is something common throughout many religions and beliefs but is something that tends to be pushed aside as an afterthought. People don’t usually think about them except for adding more detail to the devil or his demon cronies. They’re a part of something bigger and don’t usually get their own highlight. That’s a shame because the hellhound could be the religious version of an animal attack, trapped in a location while someone or something tries to get in kind of story. That’s perfect for horror. Yet, it doesn’t happen that often. Hellhounds don’t get the representation they deserve in modern culture.

Here are a few notes to end off the post:

• Rottweiler was suggested by @einsteinsarcade, who also suggested From Hell to the Wild West (week 308).
• The only returning Sunday “Bad” Movies actor was Nicholas Aaron, who was previously in Death Race: Beyond Anarchy (week 311).
• Have you seen Rottweiler? What did you think? What are your thoughts on hellhounds? Let me know in the comments.
• Twitter and the comments are places where you can find me and tell me what movies I should be checking out for the Sunday “Bad” Movies. It’s nice to have a variety of sources to pick movies from.
• There’s an Instagram account for the Sunday “Bad” Movies. Some interesting things happen there, so check it out sometime.
• Next week, I’ll be returning to a series I visited a few years ago. Every movie in that franchise could easily be a part of this blog. It’s time for the fourth entry, the space entry. I’ll be watching Leprechaun 4: In Space for next week’s post, so I hope you’ll all come back to check that out. See you then.