Knives Out (2019)

Throughout the film, the family has two pet dogs, who are seen performing such mild action as sitting/standing/lying, being held or petted, and walking/running on or off leash. For all of these scenes, trainers used hand signals and verbal commands to cue the mild action, which the trained dogs were accustomed to performing. The barking/growling was also a trained behavior.

In the scene where the dogs run from the mansion in slow motion, the trainer held both dogs by the collar at their mark on the side of the estate driveway. The other trainer stood at the end point for dogs across the lawn. On action, the other trainer stood up and waved his arm to get the dogs attention. On action, the first trainer released dogs giving the command “Go to.” The dogs ran across the yard to the other trainer who placed pieces of kibble in two bowls for dogs as reward.

In the scene where the actor approaches the house and the dogs bark at him from behind the fence, trainers walked the dogs to the set on the leash. Then the trainers placed two balls attached to rope and placed them in actor’s jacket pocket as rehearsed. The actor then walked to the car in the driveway. Trainers stood a few feet from the actor with the dogs on leashes. The actor lifted the balls and showed the dogs he had them. The dogs reacted by barking and pulling on their leashes

Due to limited resources, American Humane Association did not monitor some of the dog action.