5 out of 5

Director: Lawrence Guterman

Yes, I too brushed this off when it came out, so I totally don’t blame you. But Cats & Dogs slots into that oddly out-of-place children’s film that caters to the youngins but seems to be written for the oldins. It’s not quite as “smart” as your Pixar lovey-doveys, but I dare pixar to think up something so foolishly silly and awesome as the mouse indoctrination scene. Essentially you have what the title implies here – Cats & Dogs – and there’s a nefarious plot about to substitute cat as man’s best friend. That’s part of what’s nice about this first movie, that it’s okay making cats bad and dogs good. It ditches away some play-nice sincerity that seems to be a necessity in most kid films. The film is full of plenty of puns and sight gags, but what really pushes it overboard is its sense of creativity and playfulness within this genre. Talking animals have been around for a long time, but CGI let’s us be more “realistic” with it. Which is all fun and good – save that the funniest feline in this thing is animatronic. (Besides the facial expressions, they seemed to do a lot with real actors / animatronics, which helped.) But the “real” backhistory of cats and dogs, the fact that they CAN actually talk (that it’s not just how they hear barks and meows), and the twisted application of spy tropes to the animal world all show unbound creativity. There is a family subplot, but the writers and director actually tie it well into the main story and avoid the weepiness that plagues kid films. It’s funny how the smartest kid movies always avoid the overt cliches… you think that’d be the pattern by now. Oh well. It all adds up to a totally successful, fun, silly, cohesive whole.