snootsncoots This is actually a dog movie. It's also about getting over a loss. The more times you watch it, the more things become clear, because it's more complex than just a story about a guy who was a dog in a past life.The first time I watched it, I didn't know where the movie was going, and it does start slow. The surviving son of a crotchety old man is doing is weekly visit with his father, who has no appreciation for it. Then Dean Spanley comes into the picture.I love this movie. It will surprise you, and it's got a wonderful ending.

Peter Kettle Dean Spanley is certainly among the most delightful and subtle films I've seen for a long time. It is an unpretentious labour of love, a co-production of New Zealand and Britain, made partly with lottery money. Apart from being, in an entirely unsentimental way, the most interesting film about man and dogs, it is also brilliantly shot, wonderfully acted, and entirely lacking in all the ingredients a focus group or a big studio would demand. No heroics, indeed no hero; no sex; no violence; and no real drama. It has, instead, a wry humour, much deep imagination, and a series of fine performances by Sam Neill, Peter O'Toole, Bryan Brown, Jeremy Northam and the consistently wonderful Judy Parfitt. It has a great cameo by Dudley Sutton as well. It isn't a wonderful earth shatteringly important masterpiece in world cinema but it merits a burst of enthusiasm for its celebration of wit, humour, and the sadness all of us have to bear. The story comes from the short novel by Lord Dunsany, an odd writer who I admire. A widower (Peter O'Toole) cannot come to terms with his elder son's death in the Boer war and the subsequent demise of his wife. The question of dogs being reincarnated as humans arises over the consumption of a rare imperial Tokay. Richly atmospheric, this is a profound gem.

The_late_Buddy_Ryan Despite its lofty pedigree (it's based on a novel by Lord Dunsany), formidable cast and handsome period locations, this 100-minute shaggy dog story long overstays its welcome and left us feeling disappointed. The premise is that Horatio Fisk (Peter O'Toole), a cranky old gentleman in Edwardian London, is unable to mourn the death of his wife and son, the latter killed in the Boer War, or to make any emotional connection with his surviving son, a subdued Jeremy Northam, who supplies the voice-over narration. The problem turns out to be that the old man's never recovered from the loss of his beloved dog, a spaniel called Wag, when he was a boy. The younger Fisk discovers, through a lengthy investigation that takes up the first and much more involving half of the film, that an otherwise sober and uninteresting clergyman, W.A.G. Spanley (Sam Neill), when plied with a glass or three of vintage tokay, can hold an audience spellbound with his reminiscences of a previous life as a dog… I'm guessing the original tale has been brushed up a bit by veteran screenwriter Alan Sharp in accordance with contemporary notions of closure and father-son bonding, and Neill does a great job with his big scene as Wag the dog, but the film had lost momentum by that point and the attempted feel-good ending totally failed to connect with us. Neill, a part-time Kiwi, seems to have attracted some NZ Film Board funds to this admirable-in-principle but unsuccessful venture.

ziek-169-853647 An incredibly pleasant and unexpected surprise.Surrender the one hundred minutes and be attentive to this incognito masterpiece - a refreshingly warm and wonderful experience perpetrated by the author, the producer, the director and consummate actors in made-for-roles. For the mature of all ages.Quote - Young Fisk: "It is a common place observation that remarkable events often have ordinary beginnings"Quote - Old Fisk to Young Fisk: "One moment you are running along, the next, you are, no more"Ziek /bamfrmcan