Man’s Best Friend (1993)

While this is a very violent movie, all precautions were taken by both the trainer and the production company to make sure that the dog was never in any danger. Most scenes were done with verbal and visual cues given to the dog, who had been carefully trained for each scene. Food and praise were always given as rewards. The scene where Max chases the cat up a tree and swallows it, was done in cuts. The dog and cat had been trained together. In the chase down the street, there was always approximately fifteen feet between them. The cat was running to a toy, with food as a reward. The dog was running to visual and hand cues, also with food as a reward. When the cat climbs a tree to escape, he, again, is running after a toy. Trick photography was used where it appears that Max is also climbing the tree. Actually Max was crawling on a log. A fake dog head was used when it appears that Max has the cat in his mouth. The cat had walked in the back end of the fake dog head and out through the mouth. When the cat appears to be swallowed by the dog, it was a trainer off camera pulling the cat backwards through the mouth of the fake dog head. In the scene where you see the mailman mace Max, Max shakes off the mace, as if it were nothing, and begins chasing the mailman, who jumps over a fence. Max is right after him, grabbing hold of his leg, and as the mailman lies on the other side of the fence, Max jumps the fence and kills him. Actually it was not mace that was used, but water. When you saw Max attacking the mailman, it was either a fake dog head on a real leg or the real dog holding onto a fake leg. The shovel in the junkyard was made of rubber. However, you never actually see the shovel hitting Max on screen. When the junkyard dealer blowtorches the face of Max, it was a fake dog head that received the burns. When Max realizes Perry is trying to poison him, he takes off and chases Perry, who escapes in his truck. Being frustrated by this, Max knocks over the parrot’s cage and kills him. The scene was established with a real parrot, but it is a fake parrot that is in the cage when it is knocked over. On screen you see feathers flying. These were fake feathers that had been thrown around by the prop man. Max then puts the poisoned meat in the toilet and flushes it down the drain. The dog had been trained to do this and was responding to verbal and visual cues from his trainer, again with food as a reward. When Max escapes from the junkyard, he goes back to his house and walks up the side of the house. This was done with trick photography. It was a fake dog that jumps through the closet door attacking Perry, but the real dog pulls Perry out of the closet. The dog had been taught to pull on socks, which Perry had tied around his ankles. To make him easy to pull, Perry was lying on a plank with rollers. Max, going berserk, runs down the stairs and a neighborhood boy attempts to stop him with a baseball bat. The bat was made of rubber. When the police arrive they start shooting at Max. Only quarter loads were used in the scenes and Max was never in any danger. Max, when jumping over the police cars, was in reality jumping from a platform over fake sides of cars. In the chase where Max is running down the street, the cars were never really close to Max. In all of the scenes where Max jumps over fences, etc., he was jumping from a platform, either onto padding or onto softened ground. When Max chases Dr. Jarrett and Laurie’s car down the street and jumps on it, causing it to crash into the EMAX building, he actually jumped onto the padded roof of a stationary car that was on a slow moving flatbed of a truck. The trainers, off camera, were on the roof of the car with Max and safety precautions were taken so that Max couldn’t fall off either side of the car. Max was not on the car when it actually turned over. When Max is hit in the head with the paper by the paper boy, it was not a rolled up paper that hit Max, but a paper with foam inside. When Max chases the paper boy down the street, the boy falls off and Max rips his tire apart. Max had previously been trained to pull on a rubber tire. He was responding to his trainer’s visual and verbal cues with food as a reward. In one scene you see animal control officers trying to pull a little dog on a Come-Along. The officers were actually pretending to be rough with the little dog, who was barking in response to cues from his trainers. Max had been trained to growl and speak by using a large bone to cue the dog. When Max’s eyes are wild and glassy after he is blowtorched, contact lenses were used. The dog wore them for no longer than two minutes. In the beginning there is a laboratory scene where various primates have devises on their heads, and cats and rabbits have burns and scars on them. All devises were light, fake props. All burns and scars were fake. In one of the scenes, Max falls in love with a Collie by the name of Heidi. He jumps the fence where she lives, climbs through the window, and seduces her. Here again, the dog jumped from a platform onto soft ground. In the end of the picture, Laurie is walking the new little dog that Perry has given her, and as she passes Heidi’s home the neighbor boy invites her in to see their new puppies. All of them look like Heidi, except one little black dog, who looks like Max.