Name me a decent film with or about dogs? Did you think Beethoven, Homeward Bound maybe Lassie. Are they any good or just films you loved as kids? It doesn’t necessarily mean they are bad movies; you had to love them as kids so they were doing something right. Well I saw the press screening of a new film about dogs “Hotel for Dogs”. When I first heard the title, all I thought was some gangster film from America, how wrong could I be. This extremely kiddie friendly film is about two orphan kids who are dying to own a dog, when a stray dog finds its way into their lives they decide to hide it out in a derelict hotel.
This hotel eventually becomes the hotel in question, this half way house for vagrant canines is the one ingenious thing in the whole film. Of course one of the kids is quite good with technical things and the devices used to keep the dogs hidden and to help them use the hotel amenities are entertaining. That is where the good points end, like so many films before this one it is predictable, contrived and badly acted. Cut the humans out and you have about a half hour “animals do the strangest things” programme.
Anyway moving on, it’s the Baftas, strangely as I’m typing, thanks to the wonders of the internet I am watching them live whilst “The Devils wears Prada” booms out of the TV. Heath Ledger won the best supporting actor as expected; no one can question his performance. Danny Boyle has just won best Director for a film I’m yet to see and Mickey Rourke (the new comeback king) has just won best Actor. I can’t really comment on any of these as I’m yet to see a large amount of the movies, I’m not a big film journo, yet! I have just enjoyed a rather funny acceptance speech from Mickey Rourke.
I’m afraid I may have to end this column before I meet my landmark of 500 words, of course it’s self inflicted but there really is no news worth talking about. So thanks for reading, so till next week, keep watching.
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