Athena, here again sub “woofin’” for Gino. For those who don’t remember me, I’m a 13 year old Siberian Husky, and Gino lets me watch and review some of the movies for you guys. Times like these you need a dog’s eye view, and I happen to have two of them, a blue one and a brown one. Who says dogs are colorblind? I don’t get to go into the theater here a whole lot, something about fur in the equipment. I thought I was bein’ helpful because Gino’s always saying he doesn’t get enough software for his PS3. Hey, I got the softest wear around here. Well, Gino let me in again a couple of nights ago to watch the latest in the “Buddies” films. You might remember that I told you about Snow Buddies about 7 years ago. (That’s 1 year in human years). That was the first “Buddies” films I got to see, and I liked it a lot. Of course, that might have something to do with the star, Shasta, who’s about the cutest dog this side of…well…me. She was a cute little Siberian Husky puppy. I’m sorry to say that Shasta isn’t in this one. But before you start to decide you don’t want to watch this movie, let me give you my rulin’.
All of the retriever Buddies are back for this one. You are introduced to the “Buddies” right at the start, so it doesn’t really matter if you saw any of their other films. There’s Bud-Ha (Cate), a wise meditational pup. Next up is Mud-Bud (Hodges), an always dirty pup with a fondness for rolling in the dirt. The female Buddy is Rose-Bud (Mumy), who is the girly part of the team all decked out in a bow. Bud-Derball (Fliter) is the normal one of the bunch, followed by the rappin’ pup, B-Dawg (Gisondo). The “Buddies” each have their own particular ball toy, and even though owned by different families, play and get into trouble together. This time the Buddies sneak into a space center when the kids are invited to watch a launch of a ship as part of their school trip. Boy, I never got to go on any trips when I went to school. It was always: stay, sit, come. You get the idea. The Buddies manage to sneak on the ship just as it gets blasted off into space. They thought the sign said “lunch”. Silly dogs. I know how to spell lunch. That spells T R E A T. The ship ends up at a Russian space station run by a terrier named Sputnik. Sputnik has a crazy human friend named Yuri. Gino tells me those are pretty special names for space things. Yuri was the name of the first human in space. Of course, we dogs beat them to it by a couple of years. Sputnik was the name of the first satellite put into orbit. Both of these accomplishments were by Russians, which is where Siberia happens to be. No wonder I’m so smart. Anyway, the Buddies need to get some gas so they can continue on to the moon. Now I know how to get there, because Gino’s always tellin’ me he’s going to send me there. The Buddies get into space suits and jump all over the moon. When playtime was over they get back in the space ship and came back to Earth. I bet they got a lot of treats and belly rubs when they got back.
You can’t really talk about this movie without mentioning the special effects. The Buddies talk again, and computers make it look like their lips are moving. I don’t think they did as good a job this time. It doesn’t help that the voice cast has changed a bit for each of the “Buddies” films. The pups aren’t the same either, so if you’re looking for consistency, you won’t find it here. There’s a real cool meteor shower that looks like the real thing. These hot rocks go flying all over the place. The space ship looks real neat as well. The pups in their suits playing on the moon looks so fake, I think even your pups will think it looks lame. There’s also a ferret in this one that helps the Buddies from the control center on Earth. The humans don’t do much, but that’s okay. This is a dog movie, after all.
I liked this movie, but I have to admit it wasn’t near as much fun as Snow Buddies was. It’s not even because there isn’t a husky in this one. The space theme was cool, but it sure looked like the writers had to work real hard to make this one believable. The Buddies didn’t really get to do their thing. They were often restrained or in bulky suits. That took away a lot of the cute factor for me, and I’ll bet for your pups as well. I like seeing dogs do a lot of running and jumping, and this movie doesn’t have very much of that and that spells Y A W N. This is also a movie that will look just downright silly to you older humans. I don’t think you’ll be able to get into this one. I think you should go back and watch Snow Buddies again instead. That one was really…well…cool.
Video
When Gino mentioned high definition, I said 8 feet. He looked at me kind of funny, but that’s how I define high. I don’t know any dogs that could jump higher than that. Turns out what he meant was that this was the first “Buddies” film released in something called HD. The image is something he called 1080p. I guess the p stands for puppies, but I didn’t see that many of them. I did see some really good colors. And the picture looked so real it was like looking out the window. Don’t tell Gino, but I left a wet spot on his screen when I tried to take a hot dog away from BuderBall. Gino wanted me to tell you that you get these 1080 puppies from an AVC/MPEG-4 codec. He said it had a high bit rate, but I didn’t see the dogs bite anyone. I guess that’s why he needed a dog to explain things. I don’t think Gino was paying much attention at all. The picture was so sharp that I almost cut my nose going for that hotdog. It’s a sweet picture, and it kept my tail waggin’ the whole time.
Audio
I told you all before. A dog can hear a lot better than a human can, but there just wasn’t as much to hear this time. Most of it was people (or dogs) talkin’ about stuff. In Snow Buddies there was wind and snow and lots of things going on around you. That’s just not the case in this movie. Gino said it had a DTS-HD 5.1 uncompressed audio presentation. There was some rumbling from the bass, and it wasn’t even my tummy looking for a treat. Most of the time it was all in front of you.
Special Features
Buddy Bloopers: About 3 minutes of made up mistakes. It was just silly.
Disneypedia – The Buddies Guide To Space: For 13 minutes you can watch some of the movie magic that went into making the film. There are also some facts on real spaceships and a history of space travel. Those Buddies sure do get a lot of treats when the do a movie. Maybe I can do a movie, too. They can call it Agent: Athena. I can play super spy Athena, 009 with a license for rabies.
Buddy Facts: This is an option that lets popup menus occur during the movie. It’s filled with fun facts about the Buddies and space. It distracted me, though.
Buddy Finder: It’s a scavenger hunt game. You play during the movie. You try to locate 100 items in the film, using the color buttons on your remote to score.
Music Video: The lip synching on this song is worse than the Buddies.
Final Thoughts:
So, there you have it, another Buddies film. I hope they make more just because it gets me into the theater. You’d be surprised what Gino and his guests lose in the seat cushions. I think you might be best just to rent this one. It’s more novel than the others but far less exciting. If anything else it’s always good to see other dogs getting into trouble for a change. Rent it. I’m Athena, and that’s my rulin’, Woof! These guys always seem to end up going where they shouldn’t go. Now that’s what I call a “repeat offender”.
