By MICHAEL GINGOLD
The film has impressed audiences at Tribeca, Fantasia, FrightFest and other festivals.
Cartuna has announced that it has picked up North American distribution rights to DOG OF GOD, the animated folk-horror feature that’s Latvia’s submission for the 2026 Academy Awards (the country took Best Animated Feature at this year’s Oscars for FLOW). Written and directed by Lauris Ābele and Raitis Ābele, with co-writing by Ivo Briedis and Harijs Grundmanis, it has also been shortlisted for Best Animated Feature by the European Film Awards and will hit theaters next year. The synopsis: “DOG OF GOD is a dark, hallucinatory period horror-fantasy set in a 17th-century Livonian village, where religious fervor, accusation, and otherworldly phenomena converge. The film follows villagers as a missing relic, whispered witchcraft, and a self-proclaimed werewolf called the ‘Dog of God’ upend their fragile order. Rendered in meticulously crafted rotoscope animation, the film blends the grotesque, the poetic, and the absurd with folkloric dread.”
“DOG OF GOD is one of those films that defies categorization–it’s part parable, part fever dream,” says Cartuna founder and CEO James Belfer. “It’s bold, unsettling, and darkly funny in all the best ways. Lauris and Raitis have such a singular vision and we’re thrilled to champion it to audiences who crave something truly new in animation.”
Says director Raitis Ābele, “The distributors I talked to were impressed and afraid. Cartuna was no exception.” We’ll keep you posted on the release details.
