DVD Reviews

Old Dogs - Blu-ray Review - Clips Added!

By Jeff Swindoll Mar 10, 2010, 15:58 GMT

$John Travolta and Robin Williams star in Old Dogs, the hilarious family comedy that will have you howling. Two best friends have their lives turned upside down when they\'re unexpectedly charged with the care of seven-year-old twins while on the verge of the biggest business deal of their lives. The clueless bachelors stumble in their efforts to take care of the children, leading to one debacle after another, with a$

John Travolta and Robin Williams star in Old Dogs, the hilarious family comedy that will have you howling. Two best friends have their lives turned upside down when they\'re unexpectedly charged with the care of seven-year-old twins while on the verge of the biggest business deal of their lives. The clueless bachelors stumble in their efforts to take care of the children, leading to one debacle after another, with a ...more

Both John Travolta and Robin Williams have fleas in this flick. Old Dogs goes goofball comedy and the more discriminating filmgoer will feel like they’ve had a left lifted on them. If you’re a kid though you might find some giggles in this flea-bitten mutt.

Charlie Reed (John Travolta) and Dan Rayburn (Robin Williams) are two best friends that run a very successful sports marketing firm. They’ve recently taken on Craig (Seth Green) as a junior partner and the company is working the deal of a lifetime marketing with a Japanese company.

Dan gets some good news in that his ex-wife Vicki (Kelly Preston), that he hasn’t seen in seven years, is back in town. Well, they were married for a wild tropical weekend when Charlie whisked Dan away on a vacation to forget his messier first divorce. Dan still pines for Vicki and is over-excited to finally see her again.

He gets the surprise of his life when he finds out that their weekend of passion has produced twins Zach (Conner) and Emily (Ella Bleu Travolta). He’s even more surprised when Vicki tells him that she’s going to have to serve a short jail sentence for an environmental protest. Dan agrees to watch the kids as a way to get back with Vicki and he ropes committed bachelor Charlie into helping him.

If you drop a bit of meat in front of a dog, the animal won’t care if it’s a filet mignon or yesterday’s leftovers. Old Dogs is yesterday’s leftovers and they may have been in the sun too long.

The plot of Old Dogs feels like it has been around long enough to have a bevy of fleas. It’s the classic fish out of water scenario as Dan, who is a nerve-addled wreck anyway, finds out that he has two kids and has to have a crash course in daddying. Of course, over the time he has with the kids we have numerous comedy set pieces, Dan decides to give up fatherhood, and at the last minute has to have a big finale to see the errors of his ways and get back into his fledgling family.

It even has Charlie seeing the errors of his bachelor ways and changing them. The laughs will come if you’re not picky.

The set pieces are formulated in movie logic. For example, the duo goes to child entertainer Jimmy Lunchbox (the late Bernie Mac in his final performance) to co-opt his remote control device so Charlie can “drive” Dan during a tea party with his daughter. Of course, things don’t go as swimmingly as first thought but only so the audience can giggle at the results.

It all feels planned out and even if you can’t see the strings with the remote control device you know that the strings are being pulled for the audience’s sake only. That’s the way with the entire film. I should note that my kids didn’t care about any of that. Kids will see the funny puppy, I see the newcomer into the home that will eat tons of dog food and then crap on the rug that I’ll have to clean. Your viewpoint may vary.

Old Dogs is presented in a 1080p high definition transfer (1.85:1). Special features are presented in high definition and start with a commentary by director Walt Becker, producer Andrew Panay, and writers David Diamond and David Weissman.

Next are 4 minutes of deleted scenes, the 3 minute “Young Dogs Learn New Tricks” in which the pint-sized performers interview Williams and Travolta, 7 minutes of music videos, and 3 minutes of bloopers. The disc is also BD-Live enhanced. Disc two is a DVD copy of the film and disc three is a digital copy.

Old Dogs should probably be put to sleep, but less discriminating film watchers may laugh at the antics of our two clueless bachelors. Disney does provide you with three differing ways to watch it in this set, but I can’t imagine taking this flea-bitten mutt anywhere but to the pound.