When his light plane crashes in the Alaskan wilderness, Special Forces veteran James Belmont (Brad Pitt) must make his way more than 50 miles across dangerous terrain to find safety. His only companion is Odin, a traumatised German Shepherd that fought with him in the field.

I am not going to lie to you: I was deeply hesitant to bother with Heart of the Beast, a new survival adventure directed by David Ayer and written by Cameron Alexander. It is not simply the generic title. Just how many one-man-and-a-dog stories does American cinema need to tell? It is also slightly weird for audiences to score two films in a row that prominently feature a lone, rugged man flying a light plane with his pet dog. Ridley Scott’s The Dog Stars failed to impress me, and it seems like it failed to attract an audience either. My gut was telling me that Heart of the Beast was going to go roughly the same way.

I am here to assure you that it doesn’t: against all of my expectations, the film revealed itself to be a dramatic and likeable work, tightly edited and well performed, and represents a rock-solid and accomplished slice of screen entertainment. While it does not stretch its formula in any profound way, it does exactly what it advertises and is unashamed in doing it. I am not even a dog person really, but James and Odin’s adventure hooked me very effectively.

The film begins with a young woman (Anna Lambe) driving a car along an isolated road. She stops, because there is a random dog standing in the middle of the track. The film then skips back one week to reveal what happened to the dog to get him there.

This is a film for dog lovers, because the very first thing Ayer and Alexander do is reassure their audience: the dog will be fine. This is not remotely a spoiler, since it happens within three minutes of the film starting. Instead it is reassurance. Pitt’s lonely, taciturn green beret veteran is another matter. From crisis to crisis, he comes across as some sort of battered “Energiser bunny”. He only crashes his plane because he suffers a minor heart attack in mid-flight. From there it a wonder just how many scrapes, wounds, and other injuries he is going to endure. It is hard going for him, and the incidents are tremendously staged and surprisingly tense.

Mauro Fiore’s cinematography captures some incredible scenes of mountains and forests. The film has New Zealand stand in for Alaska, but the illusion worked for me just fine. A tight running time of 101 minutes keeps things moving along an urgent pace. The film’s CGI is effective and believable, with the various wild animals that James encounters realised through visual effects rather than trained animals. Odin, of course, is real, and Ayer manages to edit together a wonderful performance out of real-life Alsatian Uber.

Pitt is very impressive as well. Acting is usually a process of reacting, and for that performers generally work best with at least one other person to bounce off against. For much of the film – spare a nice early appearance by J.K. Simmons – Pitt has a dog, or he is alone. It is challenging to pitch a performance in this manner, and he does a superb turn in his role.

Heart of the Beast works exceptionally well with a straight-forward, effective screenplay – it comes from the much-vaunted “Black List” – and is brought to life with smart direction by David Ayer. I did not expect to like it. I certainly did not expect to like it as much as I did.

Heart of the Beast opens on 25 September in North America and September 24 in Australia. Check your own country for details.