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 to access audio and video on collective you need real player.Comedian Bobcat Goldthwait does it doggy-style. There’s a contentious, taboo-busting premise at the heart of relationship comedy Sleeping Dogs – but journalists have been requested not to divulge it. Whether this is to drum up extra hype, or to avoid spooking audiences potentially offended by its inflammatory “sexual indiscretion”, the resulting embargo makes things tricky. It could also seem somewhat disingenuous. Given the punning title and the original poster which featured a cute young couple in bed either side of a rather fetching canine, it might seem a case of locking the bedroom door after the mutt has bolted.  Our heroine Amy (Melinda Page Hamilton, the nun from Desperate Housewives) has a seemingly picture-perfect existence with dreamy fiancé and doting parents – until her husband-to-be suggests sharing their most private secrets. Despite great reluctance, Amy eventually confesses hers – only for her entire life to spectacularly implode. “She reveals her darkest sexual secret to ill effect,” summarises the permanently sunny Page Hamilton. “It’s about whether honesty is the best policy in relationships.” “We’re talking about human relationships,” her deadpan director Bobcat Goldthwait quickly interjects. “Not the one between her and the dog.” Given Goldthwait’s outrageous track record – he’s probably best known either for playing yowling nutjob Zed in the Police Academy series, directing sour cult comedy Shakes The Clown or attempting to set fire to The Tonight Show’s set mid-interview - Sleeping Dogs is likely to confound more expectations if the movie’s twist is, er, blown. The controversial act occurs – offscreen – within the first few minutes, leading instead to an unexpectedly sensitive, rather melancholy examination of men, women and the stuff that comes between them: issues including far more than pets.  “Of course there’s the incident that people seem to talk about in this movie,” says Goldthwait. “But when I watch it with audiences, that’s not the scene that people actually get worked up at. They start yelling at the screen when they don’t want certain characters to even be in the same room, and that makes me pretty happy when there’s some arty-farty festival crowds, and suddenly it’s like watching a movie in Times Square [with people shouting] ‘Don’t go in that room!’” Besides, leaving everything to our imagination helps. “There isn’t that Ned Beatty-getting-raped-by-a-hillbilly scene,” Goldthwait points out, contrasting his discreet handling with the notoriously graphic sequence from Deliverance. “So you won’t get audiences going ‘Squeal like a pig, Melinda.’” Obviously. Man’s best friend makes a different noise entirely.
Leigh Singer
Sleeping Dogs, on selected release 16 March 07.
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