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Hotel for Dogs (2009)

Director: Thor Freudenthal

Time Out rating

Average user rating

62 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

Strictly half-term fodder it may be, but this amiable kiddie flick delivers on its promises: you get lots of dogs doing cute stuff. The set-up has a brother and sister (Emma Roberts, Jake T Austin, Identi-Kit moppets) struggling to keep their pet Jack Russell terrier a secret from their pernickety foster parent (Lisa Kudrow, a game meanie). An abandoned downtown hotel provides an ideal bolt-hole and, they begin to plot, could offer kinder accommodation for the city’s unwanted canines than the municipal pound. With a couple of pet shop assistants facilitating transport and product-placement doggie treats, the dream becomes reality, thanks muchly to little bro’s Heath Robinson-esque contraptions keeping massed pooches fed and watered while the authorities try to work out where all the strays are.

True, there’s only the merest suggestion of an education system for these juveniles, but credibility’s secondary when you’ve got lots of dogs doing cute stuff. There’s a treadmill for automated walkies, a canine-operated ball thrower, while bodily functions are catered for by production-line poop-scooping. A whole spectrum of breeds, shapes and sizes supply the aww-factor (pugs with aerobics headbands), but there’s some welcome emotional underpinning too, since the foster kids need a good home as much as their four-legged friends. Enter Don Cheadle as a kindly social services officer: when they start giving actors awards for films they’d rather leave off their CVs, he’ll be up there on the podium.

Author: Trevor Johnston 2009-02-10 11:24:17

Time Out London Issue 2008, 12 -18 February, 2008

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User reviews of this film

shelby joss said...

Posted on Feb 16 2009 12:29 hotel for dogs is really good and the dogs are really cute oh and its funny

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wendy said...

Posted on Feb 15 2009 23:12 we loved it

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jimmy said...

Posted on Feb 15 2009 23:08 everyone who said this was a bad film must of been watching a different film my wife and i and our two children loved it !

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eliza faz said...

Posted on Feb 15 2009 19:22 eliza and sadie say they will behave they really eant to see the film

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jayne faz said...

Posted on Feb 15 2009 19:20 hi there might take the girls tommorrow if they behave themselves,it looks good.I will keep you posted....

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Z O E said...

Posted on Feb 15 2009 17:21 Im going to see this film with my mum,, spend some time together can anybody tell me if you think this film will do ?? Thanks xx

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megan said...

Posted on Feb 14 2009 20:26 well i was looking at films for sataurday cus im going to the cinima and i saw this but im stiil not sure so i was going to ask ppl who read this if they could give me advice by sat xx

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kate said...

Posted on Feb 14 2009 10:32 it looks greak not rubbish im going to c it 2day wiv my friend jo

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olivia said...

Posted on Feb 13 2009 18:38 Going to see this film tonight, it looks well good.

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AMY said...

Posted on Feb 11 2009 21:08 this film looks really good im gonna watch it on friday te 13th.

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sophie said...

Posted on Feb 11 2009 17:00 I'am really excited about the film because iam going for it on my birthday whoo hoo

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joseph said...

Posted on Feb 08 2009 12:28 Hotel for Dogs is the story of a couple of orphaned kids who take in stray pups and make a home for them in an abandoned New York hotel. You see, the kids feel a kinship with these cast-off mutts because they, too, have no one to look after them. Bighearted social worker Bernie (Cheadle) is doing his best to find Andi (Roberts) and the precocious Bruce (Austin) a good family, but he really screws the pooch when he lands the siblings with foster parents Lois and Carl Scudder (Kudrow and Dillon), a dim-witted couple who intend to form a band and drop their “rock manifesto” on an unsuspecting world.
It’s a mutt movie more in the spirit of Benji the Hunted than Homeward Bound, but the lack of actors lending their voices to the canine conversations isn’t a detriment—the hounds themselves are very expressive without flat celebrity quips about it being a dog’s world. As Benji proved, the human element can be more of a hindrance than a help. The film would’ve been better served, however, if the maudlin human struggles and teenybopper romance had been cut and replaced with a bunch of Shiba Inu puppies rolling around the hotel lobby. (Opens Fri.)—Drew Toal

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stephnie said...

Posted on Feb 08 2009 12:26 i mite be going to see this movie todayy from wat i havr read about it i think it will be realy good and jt austin is kind of cut lol

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melissa said...

Posted on Feb 08 2009 10:09 im really exsited im going to see this today ooks great

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judy said...

Posted on Feb 07 2009 14:32 brilliant film for kids, funny, light hearted with a touch of romance. my daughter would love to see it again. well worth the money even i enjoyed it.

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