First Take: Show Dogs- sound the alarms, there’s a rant incoming

SYNOPSIS:

Max, a macho, solitary Rottweiler police dog is ordered to go undercover as a primped show dog in a prestigious Dog Show, along with his human partner, to avert a disaster from happening.

It’s become a yearly tradition on this blog to review at
least 1 film that is questionable in terms of its quality, and unfortunately,
this year it’s the turn of a film with talking dogs. It’s been ripped apart by
American audiences, more on that in a bit, but the big question is did I enjoy
Show Dogs? Hell no.

Raja Gosnell (director of Big Momma’s House, and editor of Pretty Woman amongst other credits) is in charge of this 92 minute PG rated film, and, well, he doesn’t do a good job. The pacing is about as messy as the kitchen of someone who’s hosted a house party, and working to a script from Max Botkin, Mark Hyman (and if reports are to be believed, 13 other writers), the humour just doesn’t work, and all of the references are so dated that it’s obvious that the film has been stuck in development hell for years. It’s shot decently by David Mackie, and the score from Heitor Pereira isn’t memorable- this is only the start of my issues with this one.

Performance wise, there isn’t really anything special. Will
Arnett does a decent job holding it all together, Ludacris is pretty good, and
the supporting cast which includes Natasha Lyonne, Alan Cumming, Stanley Tucci,
RuPaul, Jordin Sparks and many others save this film from going to the depths
of hell currently occupied by The Emoji Movie- as a result, this film manages
to put itself in the middle ground of mediocrity, right in between Nine Lives
(which is arguably a masterpiece by this film’s standards) and said advert
Emoji film. It didn’t pass the 6 laugh test, and the funniest bit were seeing how poor the CGI was- there are so many things wrong with this film.

But the main reason why I hated this film is the addition of
two scenes which reference going to a ‘happy place’ during the inspections of a
dog’s anatomy that take place at events like Crufts. This is arguably one of
the darkest things I’ve seen in a kids film (let me repeat, A KIDS FILM) because
of its link to topics which really don’t fit the PG certificate, and quite
rightly these scenes have been removed from the US cut of the film… but not
from the British version. Parents, I urge you to read up on this film before
buying your tickets- there are lots of other films out there for you and your
family this half term.

THE VERDICT

Angry. Disappointed. Regular readers will know that those are the most scathing words I can bestow upon a film, and in this case, those are the most suitable. Show Dogs simply shouldn’t be seen until the UK cut has a few edits made, and even then, the film will still suffer from an awful plot, poor pacing and direction, zero humour and a dull 90 minute run time. Peter Rabbit is still in some cinemas, go and see that instead of this so called family film.

RATING: 1/5