Old Dogs is a "turkey," writes Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times, getting into the holiday spirit. So does Ty Burr in the Boston Globe and a host of online reviewers, including one who compared it with "rancid leftovers ... a toxic turkey." Several critics note that the film had originally been set for release last April but was postponed due to the death of Bernie Mac, who has a small role in it. "I can think of another way that they might have respected his memory," writes Ebert, and Burr adds "If they had any respect for audiences, they might never have released it at all." Stephen Holden in the New York Times has to reach for a deplorable description of the movie. Calling it "a ramshackle mess doesn't begin to evoke the confusion and sloppy continuity of a movie whose disconnected parts sometimes appear to have been randomly assembled from a cutting-room scrap heap," he remarks. Kyle Smith in the New York Post doesn't even attempt to put too fine a point on it and courts a rebuke from PETA. " Old Dogs does to the screen what old dogs do to the carpet," he gibes. "It's unfortunate that only the latter can be taken out and shot." John Anderson in the Washington Post refers to it as a "comedic atrocity." As for the performances of stars John Travolta and Robin Williams, Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News comments "Travolta, who delivers an impressively enthusiastic performance, seems to have no idea that he's stuck in one of the year's worst movies. The perpetually pained expression on Williams' face, however, suggests he knows otherwise." And Michael Phillips suggests that the two ought to have starred in a film called Bumps on Logs. "Truly, I would rather watch John Travolta and Robin Williams sitting on a tree trunk, doing nothing, than endure their best efforts to energize this ol' hound."
26/11/2009
