Despite Shannon's fearlessness, 'Year of the Dog' is more than a bit of a drag

As "Year of the Dog" opens, Peggy (Molly Shannon) isn't so much happily single as comfortably resigned to it. Her big-toothed smile is polite but vacant when at work, and that frozen, friendly front continues with her pedantically self-involved friends and relatives out of reflex. It's only when she's with her pet dog, Pencil, that she's truly at ease.

Screenwriter-turned-director Mike White (he wrote "The School of Rock" and "Nacho Libre") nicely captures the sense of serenity that can come from pets and the presence of animals, but "Year of the Dog" is much more interested in the social behavior of humans driven by loneliness and emptiness.

After Pencil dies early in the film, the once-centered Peggy becomes an obsessively driven animal-rights activist, like an extreme version of her self-absorbed social circle pushed to complete zealotry.

Peggy's drive is as dangerous and insensitive as it is pure and passionate. Shannon, a former "Saturday Night Live" performer, embraces her extreme antics and disturbing behavior with a fearlessness that risks our sympathies. She's lost and lonely and desperate, but she's also very scary, and Shannon never blinks or winks at the audience in her spiral.

At his best, White's writing straddles the line between the comedy and the cruelty of emotional pain and wanders the gray area between comic mania and dangerous obsession. At his worst, however, he makes sport of his shallow characters and oblivious caricatures with a sour humor, and his supporting players are too often glib targets for White.

The curious character study is a comedy in a minor key, but for all White's fascination with Peggy, he brings little conviction to the healing message under all this creepiness and social awkwardness, beyond what Shannon brings to the role.