Description
The first live action movie ever produced by Walt Disney is on DVD for the first time ever! Fred MacMurray heads an all-star cast that includes Jean Hagen, Tim Considine, Kevin Corcoran, and Annette Funicello in her big screen debut. After years of on-the-job clashes with cranky canines, mail carrier Wilson Daniels (MacMurray) sees man's best friend as his worst enemy. This makes for one hairy situation when a magical ring accidentally transforms his teenage son Wilby (Kirk) into a lumbering sheepdog! Can Wilby break the spell and foil a team of international spies, or will both he and his dad wind up in the doghouse? Packed with sidesplitting antics, slapstick chases, and hilarious sight gags, this madcap adventure will tickle the funny bone of every two- (and four-) footed member of your family!
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Unlike the fly in the 1958 horror classic, they never really explain what happens to the neighbor's sheepdog when young Wilby Daniels trades places with it. The dog just vanishes, or is subsumed or assumed or something, leaving Wilby (Tommy Kirk) to explain to his dog-hating, allergic, mailman father (Fred MacMurray) that he's turned into a canine. The Shaggy Dog seems like the first instance of Disney packaging, as most of the principals were either Mouseketeers or had been in the short Disney segment Spin and Marty or a previous Disney film. As successful as The Absent Minded Professor for humor, Dog follows Wilby and a rival as they vie for the hand of the new French girl in school, and the girl next door (Annette Funicello). The exchanges with Wilby's younger brother, Moochie (Kevin Corcoran), who always wanted a family dog, are alone worth the price of the tape. Indeed the most successful element of this overall endearing film is the re-pairing of the two actors as brothers (they had done so before in 1957's Old Yeller). This is family fare that's diverting without pandering, a feat that the later Disney regime would have a difficult time re-creating. --Keith Simanton
Doggone Good! Classic family comedy for all ages! - Reviewed on 2008-02-11
2 customers found this review helpful.
I first saw "The Shaggy Dog" while at camp Matollionequay as little girl years ago and fell on the floor laughing. When I saw it was available on DVD, I quickly purchased it to have it for my family so my 5 year old daughter, husband and I could enjoy it together. The movie is simply infectious and has humor for all ages. I mean, the whole idea is funny - a shaggy dog driving a car, a shaggy dog talking on a phone, a shaggy dog wearing pajamas, a shaggy dog chasing SPIES??!!
"The Shaggy Dog, Wild & Wooly Edition" is the DVD version featuring the original B/W film (slightly wide angle), the colorized version, and some extras. The bonuses include cast interviews which are fun to see. I know I prefer to see the original B/W, but my 5 1/2 year old vetoed me and so we watched the colorized version.
The story is chock-full and has many veins and sub-plots, which add to the fun. Basically, the story revolves around the Daniels family, with father, Wilson (Fred MacMurray), a retired postman, who (naturally) hates dogs; his wife, played by Jean Hagen, and their two sons, Wilby (Tommy Kirk), a rather nerdy boy, and "Moochie" (Kevin Corcoran), his younger brother, who desperately wants a pet dog. They live in, yes, I'm sure, the "Leave It to Beaver" house and on that same street you see "The Beav" walking on in those old shows.
Throughout the movie, we see several stories playing out - a new neighbor moves in, an art dealer, his beautiful daughter, their butler and her shaggy dog. Through a trip to the museum, a connection between shaggy "Bratislavian Sheepdogs", an old painting of the Lady Borgia and the ability to shape shift is revealed. A mishap, a toppled table, a misplaced ring, an accidentally repeated incantation, and all at once, Wilby finds himself sprouting fur, and getting a black shiny nose! A professor of history and art advises Wilby that the spell may be intermittent. He doesn't realize how funny the adventures will be for the viewer. Wilby always seems to be getting into trouble, whether it's his father firing buckshot at his shaggy behind (don't worry, he only gets the laundry), or turning into a Bratislavian Sheepdog during a dance with the pretty new girl. Wilby, while a dog, overhears the new neighbor's plans to topple democracy, and the antics provided by a ten-year old, and a shaggy dog, and finally Wilson himself, trying to explain that yes, there is a spy ring in the neighborhood, and they know that because "My son is a dog. No, not all the time, just some of the time."(!)
Overall, this is film is great fun with really timeless humor. You can watch it again and again. There's no cursing or crude humor, so you don't have to be embarrassed to watch it with your kids or even your grandparents. I think this film would be ideal for kids today, from about age 4-15 or so, but it's good for adults, as well.
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