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The Shaggy Dog Our rating: Your rating: 1 2 3 4 Your Comments: see all MPAA rating: PG (for some mild rude humor) Genre: Children, Comedy, Family Theater release: March 10, 2006 by Disney Pictures Directed by: Brian Robbins Runtime: 1 hour 39 minutes Cast: Tim Allen (Dave Douglas), Kristin Davis (Rebecca Douglas), Robert Downey Jr. (Dr. Kozak), Danny Glover (Ken Hollister), Jane Curtin (Judge Claire Whittaker) Related: Talk About It/Family Corner

Heading up the Cineplex escalators to view The Shaggy Dog, I overheard the following succinct movie synopsis exchanged between two preteen boys: "You know that guy who turns into Santa Claus? This time he turns into a dog." While such an analysis may not reflect kindly on the dramatic range of Tim Allen's oeuvre, it does suggest, pretty accurately, what you can expect from The Shaggy Dog—good-natured, sometimes silly family fun that will play especially well with the under-13 set.

The Shaggy Dog is not really a remake of the old Disney human-goes-to-the-dogs movies (1959's The Shaggy Dog and 1976's The Shaggy D.A) in that none of the original characters (except the sheepdog) appear here. Instead, the movie makes use of the earlier films' basic plot device (man turns involuntarily canine at the most inopportune moments) and hauls it into the New Millennium, adding plenty of computer generated effects, throwing in a politically correct storyline about the evils of animal experimentation, and making the humor a little ruder and cruder. Still, to ensure that mom and dad will shell out those New Millennium ticket prices for the whole clan, The Shaggy Dog offers a series of dog-eared clichés about the importance of putting family first. If you buy lots of popcorn and don't think too hard, it's all reasonably entertaining and sometimes genuinely funny.

Tim Allen as Dave Douglas, in human form …

Allen (The Santa Clause, Christmas with the Kranks, Home Improvement) plays Dave Douglas, an ambitious lawyer who is counting on his current case to launch his campaign for District Attorney. While he's busy prosecuting Justin Forrester, an animal rights activist (who is also his daughter's popular history teacher) for the alleged arson of a medical research facility, his wife Rebecca (Kristin Davis, Sex in the City), daughter Carly (Zena Grey) and son Josh (Spencer Breslin, last seen with Allen as an elf in The Santa Clause 2) are feeling increasingly neglected. Even when his own daughter takes to wearing a "Free Justin Forrester, Stop Dave Douglas" T-shirt, Dave refuses to believe the defendant's improbable story about witnessing animal cruelty and genetic mutation at the medical research plant. But when a lovable sheepdog that Carly and her boyfriend have inadvertently dognapped from the lab bites Dave, the skeptical lawyer is confronted with evidence of genetic engineering he can't refute. Once he's turned into a dog, he learns a whole lot about both his case and his family. He discovers he's pretty good at fetch, too.

… and in canine form, here with a dozen roses for his wife.

Dave actually morphs backs and forth between human and hound—and the films' best comedy happens during the scenes of dog-onset when the lawyer is still in homo sapiens form but is overcome by canine instincts. Allen plays the part with all the broad gusto required, chasing cats and cars, eating cereal directly from the cereal bowl (sans spoon) and barking "my yard, my yard" at a neighbor's pug. These episodes are frequent in the courtroom, where an incredulous judge (the always funny Jane Curtin) is forced to warn Douglas not to "growl at opposing counsel." I will confess I laughed out loud more than once.

Less effective is the family storyline, which despite its good intentions is a little too paint-by-numbers to be as poignant as it aims to be. It doesn't help that Allen and Davis have no chemistry; the most genuinely romantic scene actually takes place when Rebecca is stood up by Dave on their anniversary and stares forlornly out the restaurant window … only to meet the gaze of her sheepdog standing on the sidewalk with a dozen red roses in his mouth. Early on, the film doesn't do a good job of establishing Dave's negligence—we seem him come home late for dinner a few times, which hardly seems to warrant his family's level of exasperation. And even when Dave eventually learns his lessons and offers his heartfelt love and support to the kids, a little sharper, fresher dialogue could have made the resolve much more affecting.

Kristin Davis as Rebecca, Dave's wife

Still, if my eight-year-old son is any indication, such quibbles won't matter to the average kid; in fact, the lack of subtlety may draw youngsters even more deeply and rapidly into the story. And the adults can have the fun of watching a twitchy Robert Downey Jr. play the evil, money and power-hungry Dr. Kozak, the research executive behind all that animal cruelty and genetic engineering. Other heavyweight actors like Danny Glover (as Dave's boss) and Philip Baker Hall (as Kozak's boss) are effective but underutilized.

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