Firehouse Dog (DVD)

Everyone loves Rexxx, the canine star of films like The Fast and the Furriest, and Jurassic Bark, he's Hollywood's golden dog (well actually he looks more like an Irish terrier). Trouble is he's depressed, he's in love with a Dalmatian who doesn't share his desires. He takes a little persuading to go and do his latest stunt as a skydiving spy dog, and as a result of his torn emotions the stunt doesn't go to plan. Rexxx ends up plummeting from the ...
...fall, and Rexxx ends up wandering the streets. Here he comes into contact with Shane, a young boy whose mother left him and whose father is the chief of a rundown fire station.

Shane believes the dog is a runaway called Dewey (the name on the collar, of the spy dog in the movie), and he takes an instant dislike to him because Dewey stops him running away when he's caught playing hooky. As a punishment his dad tells him he has to take ... more

Everyone loves Rexxx, the canine star of films like The Fast and the Furriest, and Jurassic Bark, he's Hollywood's golden dog (well actually he looks more like an Irish terrier). Trouble is he's depressed, he's in love with a Dalmatian who doesn't share his desires. He takes a little persuading to go and do his latest stunt as a skydiving spy dog, and as a result of his torn emotions the stunt doesn't go to plan. Rexxx ends up plummeting from the sky, but luckily a truck full of tomatoes breaks his fall, and Rexxx ends up wandering the streets. Here he comes into contact with Shane, a young boy whose mother left him and whose father is the chief of a rundown fire station.

Shane believes the dog is a runaway called Dewey (the name on the collar, of the spy dog in the movie), and he takes an instant dislike to him because Dewey stops him running away when he's caught playing hooky. As a punishment his dad tells him he has to take responsibility for the dog, until the real owner can be found. Shane has been struggling to be responsible since his mother had walked out on him, and his uncle (the previous fire chief) died in a fire, which his dad believes was arson. In fact he station have been dealing with a lot of arson cases lately, all involving someone who uses watches to time the devices which start the fires.

The fire is one of the cheesiest I've seen in a long time, and it was a parody of itself, but for some reason this worked, because it was actually a really enjoyable film. The kids loved it, and they were laughing hysterically all the way through it, but then it was aimed at their sort of humour, with lots of flatulence jokes and slap stick humour. There were lots of little funny moments, like Dewey forcing Shane to sleep on the floor, while he slept comfortably on the bed, and when Dewey managed some amazing acrobatics for a dog.

The acrobatics were proof positive that the film wasn't taking itself seriously, because there's no way in the world that Lassie could have managed some of those stunts, never mind your average movie star dog!

Without giving too much away, there is of course the obligatory Lassie moment that all animal film have, and this one is a very cute one, with the added bonus of having a couple of laughs.

The effects are awful, but I actual think they are meant to be awful to fit in with the style of the film, well not all of them are absolutely terrible, the explosions are okay, it's just the effects based around Dewey that are obvious. And at one point it's clear the crowd in the background are projected onto a green screen.

There are no great stars in the show, the main two are Josh Hutcherson, who plays Shane, who also starred in Journey to the Centre of the Earth (which I've seen, but I didn't recognise him, the kids recognised him straight away), and Bruce Greenwood who plays Connor (Shane's dad), looking up his profile he seems to have been in a few films, but I don't remember him at all (National Treasure 2, Star Trek 2009, i Robot). Rexxx/Dewey was played by 4 different dogs. Despite not having any big stars, the acting was fairly decent, no Oscar winning performances, but nice steady acting.

As usual the soundtrack pretty much passed me by, apart from a snippet of I Fought the Law, and the Law Won by Left Alone, I did notice a few other tunes, but there weren't any other famous ones.

This is definitely not a film for film buffs, but for anyone who likes a film just for entertainment and a few laughs then it's a nice family film. 

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