At the world premiere of “Heart of the Beast,” the red carpet’s biggest stars were the adoptable dogs walking with the film’s star, Brad Pitt.
Four rescue dogs walked the red carpet in Franklin, Tennessee, on September 16 — but none of them had a role in the film. Wags and Walks, the rescue organization with adoption centers in Nashville and Los Angeles, brought the group to the premiere of Pitt’s “Heart of the Beast” at FirstBank Amphitheater, posing them alongside the film’s star before the screening began. The premiere itself broke from the usual industry playbook: free and open to the public, held outside Nashville rather than at an invite-only event in Los Angeles or New York, with co-star J.K. Simmons and director David Ayer also on hand. Pitt, 62, arrived in a camouflage-print suit with girlfriend Ines de Ramon. “Brad Pitt and our adoptable rescue dogs at the Heart of the Beast premiere,” the event’s official Instagram account wrote.
“Heart of the Beast,” which opens nationwide September 25, follows Special Forces officer James Belmont, played by Pitt, and his combat dog, Odin, through a plane crash and a fight to survive the Alaskan wilderness. Odin is played by Uber, a German shepherd bred from a law enforcement and military line in New Zealand and trained by Andrew Simpson, whose credits include “John Wick” and “The Revenant.”
“We put Odin number one on the call sheet,” David Ayer, who directed the film, told Entertainment Weekly. Pitt, he said, “really considered himself as a supporting actor to the dog, but he’s also the dog trainer.”
Pitt, who appears onscreen with Uber through roughly 95 percent of the film, told the outlet the job tested him differently than any human costar had. “Dogs don’t necessarily know their lines,” he said, describing how he kept treats on hand to call Uber back whenever the animal wandered off mid-scene. Ayer said Uber could lose focus over something as small as “a bee flying past him,” and called what Pitt managed around it “really unbelievable.”
It isn’t the first time Pitt has taken in a dog with no script involved. He has spoken publicly about Blanco, a stray he found and kept while filming in Argentina in the 1990s.
Wags and Walks was founded in 2011 by Lesley Brog, who started pulling dogs from overcrowded Los Angeles shelters before opening a Nashville adoption center in 2023 to serve the same need across the South. The organization has placed nearly 17,000 dogs, prioritizing bully breeds, nursing mothers, and dogs with medical needs that shelters often pass over. Every adoption comes with a standing offer. “If life changes, we will always take our dogs back,” the organization says of its policy.
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