Christmas is for kids, and family entertainment, and so Cats & Dogs would seem to be a pretty strong favourite for decent Yuletide viewing. It has most of the requisite qualities you need to succeed with both kids and families - it's undemanding, shallow, and unambitious. However, you'd have to be pretty undemanding yourself to see much to entertain you from this insipid little piece of dross.
It was thrown up in a huge amount of hype and advertising to be the latest blockbuster in the world of family entertainment, but all the hype in the world can't hide the fact that Cats and Dogs is one hugely dull and childish offering which has nothing of any substance about it.
The powers that be (whoever they may be) must have thought they were onto a pretty good thing when they came up with the smart idea of partnering animatronics and special effects with human vocalising to produce an appealing mix of cats,
dogs and slapstick humour, but how wrong they were. There's an old adage that goes, "Never work with children and animals," well, unfortunately, it's not the kids or the cats that are the problem, but the hair brained adults who thought that we'd swallow this particular set of hairballs and go flocking to see Cats and Dogs. Well, let me tell you categorically that, smash hit or no, this pretty good thing is something to be avoided at all costs.
A bunch of cute felines and canines running around trying to wipe each other out in a fight to the finish is a reasonably weak idea to start with, but as the 'action' degenerates into a series of sickly set-pieces and simpering punchlines so it disintegrates fully into total folly. I really don't like this film very much at all.
You may disagree, and be able to extract a modicum of enjoyment out of the whole sorry mess, and if so, good luck. But for my money, you'd have to have just flown in from a couple of decades in the Arctic wastes or the Amazonian rain forest to get your rocks off to this one. This is bizarrely limited entertainment which has that ultimate failing about it - the makers actually think that it's hilarious stuff. You can imagine the bony fingered, lonely souls sitting in the cutting room, holding their sides with glee, congratulating themselves on their blistering wheeze. "Ooh, they'll bloody love this one, will the kiddy winkies - cats practicing martial arts on the clumsy old dogs is guaranteed to get the tears streaming." Well, it may make you smile weakly the first time, but by the time they've spread it thinly across the whole of the film, it's reached the level of being just plain irritating.
Harmless fun, you may argue, shaking your simple old head at me, don't take it so serious ... well, sorry, but I don't buy that at all. This is tripe dressed up as nouveau cuisine and about as appetising.
In recent years, the nearest thing to this particular genre has been Babe, featuring the tale of a Sheep Pig, but whereas that film had charm, intelligence and an almost sincere feel about it, Cats and Dogs is like one enormous furry copy of the Beano, with a cartoon like approach which is mirrored in the wide eyed faces perfected by the animals. And amazingly well trained though these animals may be, all the training in the world can never make up for a total lack of invention and common sense. Having said all that, the pooches and moggies are certainly a good few rungs up the food chain from a surprisingly asinine and limited contribution by Jeff Goldblum.
He's like a modern day version of the dull witted blokes who used to make a living out of working for Walt Disney in all those dire animal-and-family films in the Fifties and Sixties, eventually giving way to a VW Beetle called Herbie, who apparently went Bananas.
Cats and Dogs deals clumsily with a dire theme and plot and will embarrass you rather more than you thought possible. It even fails to make up for all that ineptitude with some of the poorest special effects you will have seen in a bloody long day. If Jurassic Park was a wonderful advert for how good special effects can be, then Cats and Dogs sets light entertainment back maybe forty years in the FX stakes.
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Production Year: 1993 - Family - Original Language: English - Classification: Universal - Starring: Michael Caine, The Muppets, Jerry Nelson, Frank Oz, Dave Goelz, David Rudman, Steve Whitmire
Family - Director: Sarah Ball - Original Language: English - Classification: Universal - Starring: Neil Morrissey, Noddy Holder, Alison Steadman, Stephen Tompkinson, Chris Evans, Elton John, Bob The Builder
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Advantages: The DVD is fairly cheap to buy and is accessible in most shops. It keeps children entertained. Disadvantages: It make cats look bad and children believe anything.
foster29 27.05.2009 ·
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Cats And Dogs (DVD)
![Cats And Dogs [DVD]](http://picnica.ciao.com/uk/78521214.jpg "Cats And Dogs [DVD]")
![Cats And Dogs [DVD] [2001]](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/78545313.jpg "Cats And Dogs [DVD] [2001]")
Dec 21st, 2002
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