Good Boy!

Entertainment Weekly Scott Brown

Little is asked of talking-animal movies, save charm, heart, and at least one scene where said animal wears a lampshade. Good Boy! has all those things, plus a winning story line.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

This furry family comedy about a boy and his border terrier is irresistible, if not exactly in the league of "Babe."

Chicago Tribune Ellen Fox

A tearily adorable canine valentine.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

The film is touchingly firm about leveling with children, drawing a careful, crucial line between fantasy and reality, without patronizing or haranguing them.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

Surprisingly nimble and fun to watch, mostly thanks to the magnificent dogs Hoffman has found to portray his lead characters, and thanks to the actors he cast as the animals' voices.

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

When it comes right down to it, the talking animal thing is sort of secondary to what is, at heart, just a simple but perfectly satisfying little story about a boy who wants to keep his dog.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

This latest offering from the Jim Henson stable puts a cheerfully broad new spin on the boy-and-his-dog franchise.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Mostly, Good Boy! exists for the middle section where youngsters and dogs speak the same language. These escapades, all taking place under the adults' radar, generate many sound laughs.

Miami Herald Christine Dolan

No, this isn't the stuff of a kiddie classic like "Holes." But, to quote from another movie with a vocal four-legged protagonist, it'll do.

USA Today Claudia Puig

No new ground is dug up in Good Boy, but the story is well-paced, sweet and lively, filling a void for very young filmgoers.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

A charming runt of a movie. It's not all it could be, but it's the best the pound had to offer this week.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

Undeniably charming -- a dog movie that's more lovable mutt than stately pedigree.

Film Threat Kevin Carr

Just what it says -- good. Not great, but not really bad, either.

Chicago Reader Ted Shen

The special effects aren't too polished but the script is larded with cutesy life lessons to warm the hearts of dog lovers

Portland Oregonian Chris Hewitt

Doesn't add much to the oft-told story of a boy and his dog, and it never establishes the rules of the dogs-in-space myth it creates, but it is perked up by the gentle intelligence of writer/director John Hoffman.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

A promising idea turns into nothing, and we're left with a painfully dull kids' picture.

Village Voice Richard Gehr

Former SNL-ers Molly Shannon and Kevin Nealon play the kid's Stepford parents in this Jim Henson Pictures happy meal.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

It’s ingratiating in that nice doggie way, but the dogs, who have had their lips enhanced via CGI to aid in the illusion of speech, don’t have much more on their minds than where the next stick is going to sail in from.

New York Post Megan Lehmann

The movie is saved by its well-trained four-legged stars and the likable Liam Aiken ("Road to Perdition"), who plays 12-year-old loner Owen Baker.

Dallas Observer David Ehrenstein

Yes it's a "family film," of the sort we've become increasingly accustomed to these days; cute dogs for the kids to coo over, and a plot just complex enough to keep the parents who've accompanied them to the theater from dozing off.

Variety Lael Loewenstein

Passable kiddy fare that, although it strenuously underscores its message of friendship and loyalty, doesn't revitalize the genre.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Paul West

Fairly good- natured and not as awful as it sounds, but it lacks distinction.

Los Angeles Times Gene Seymour

As long as you keep thinking of "Babe," you can't help thinking that there's no excuse for movies like Good Boy! to merely push the usual buttons, deploy the usual poop jokes and carry out the usual sight gags.

The New York Times Anita Gates

As children's film premises go, this is a cute one, but the execution is a failure.

TV Guide Angel Cohn

While Aiken couldn't be cuter or more-well suited for his earnest role, the script is utterly predictable and often falls into the saccharine trap. The pooches add a little life to this otherwise lackluster effort.

Empire Nick De Semlyen

In the hands of bolder storytellers this could have been a witty take on "E. T."

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Stephen Cole

In the right hands, Good Boy! might have been a ripe bit of mischief. But except for an endless drum roll of fart jokes, what we get is stuffy liberal humanism that would bore the Oshkoshes off Al Gore's littlest nieces and nephews.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Sometimes it works to show their lips moving (it certainly did in "Babe"), but in Good Boy! the jaw movements are so mechanical it doesn't look like speech, it looks like a film loop.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Talking dogs were cute, once. It's a tad disconcerting, however, when a canine starts lip syncing to the voice of Carl Reiner so it can complain about flatulence.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

Includes a few half-hearted ironies about how people are really serving dogs, not the other way around, but even those gags are cribbed from a retired Seinfeld routine.