MARMADUKE (Tom Dey). 88 minutes. Opens Friday (June 4). For venues, trailers and times, see Movies. Rating: NN
Marmaduke ambles into theatres after a wave of canine movies like Beverly Hills Chihuahua, Marley & Me and Hotel For Dogs used up all the same doggy gags it has to offer.
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Based on the popular comic strip, the film adapts the titular Great Dane’s adventures into a clichéd high school movie where poodles are ditzy Valley girls and the Rottweiler is a bully who has a hot collie as his girlfriend. Marmaduke (voiced by Owen Wilson) is that oversized, awkward teen who just moved to Cali and has trouble fitting in among the O.C.’s social cliques.
Obviously, the gimmick of talking dogs will never get old for the under-six crowd. But the film’s few cute moments can’t make up for an infantile screenplay that relies on fart jokes, pratfalls and the painfully obvious reference to “Who let the…” – you know how that ends.
Even dogs get tired of the same old tricks.
