Disney Dogs Collection Volume 1 collects 4 previously released DVDs of dog related films and puts them in a cheap 4 pack. I got Dogs V1 and 4 other four movie collections in 2018 and they were $7.49 each. A quick visit to Amazon for the set's cover tells me that Dogs V1 is currently $9.99, which is still a pretty good bargain, if you like these sorts of movies. I mostly got this for The Shaggy Dog. I'd seen it and The Ugly Dachshund back when they were relatively new. I was 6 when The Shaggy Dog came out so I'm guessing that I saw when it was aired on Walt Disney Presents 1958-1961 or Walt Disney's Wonderful World Of Color 1961-1969. I know I saw The Ugly Dachshund at the Bronx Park Community Center in Winnipeg sometime after it was in the theaters. In the 60s the center would play a kids movie every Saturday. It was a quarter to get in. They screened a lot of Disney movies in 16MM and it was well attended. I would go every Saturday. At some point the guy running the thing started asking me to run across to the Safeway and get him some quarters. He would let me in for free.
The Shaggy Dog 1959 Based on the novel The Hound Of Florence by Felix Salten. He was the same guy that wrote the novel Bambi. Bill Walsh and Lillie Hayward wrote the screenplay and Charles Barton directed. Bill wrote a lot of Disney films and TV shows, including The Absent Minded Professor, Mary Poppins, That Darn Cat!, Blackbeard's Ghost, The Love Bug and Bedknobs And Broomsticks. I've seen all of those and really enjoyed them as a kid. Most of them are still fairly entertaining but I have a deeply rooted streak of nostalgia when it comes to Disney.
Lillie wrote a large number of films and TV episodes in a career that started in 1924 with Janice Meredith and ended with Smoky in 1966. I didn't recognize much in her early work but I've seen the 1936 film The Walking Dead with Boris Karloff, in 1943 she wrote My Friend Flicka and Black Beauty in 1946, Tarzan And the Lost Safari in 1957. After that she penned The New Adventures Of Spin And Marty, the Annette TV series, plus several other Disney programs and films.
In the commentary with Tommy Kirk and Tim Considine they both are very complementary to director Charles Barton. His career started in 1934 with Wagon Wheels, a Randolph Scott movie I've seen and enjoyed. After that I don't think I'd seen any of his films until the 1940s, when he started directing films for Abbott and Costello. I know I've seen all of those. In the 1950s he moved into TV directing episodes of shows like Amos And Andy, The Great Gildersleeve and Disney's Zorro. He kept directing TV until 1971 when he retired.
Fred McMurray and Jean Hagen are the mom and dad to Tommy Kirk and Kevin Corcoran. Tim Considine is Tommy's pal and Annette Funicello is the gal that Tim and Tommy are both interested in. Cecil Kellaway is a professor at a museum and he's the source of the Borgia ring that turns people into dogs. Tim's natural clumsiness acquires the ring and reading the writing on the ring turns Tim into the big sheepdog in the house next door. For some reason the ring doesn't turn people into their own dog but merges their body with a nearby dog.
The new neighbor with the dog is played by Alexander Scourby, he's a scientist who's also a spy. He plans to steal some plans from a local military site. Tim and the gang of kids help put a stop to that.
There's plenty of silly stuff and slapstick. Good cast with Alexander Scourby, Roberta Shore, James Westerfield, Strother Martin and Paul Frees. I'd last seen this in 2009 and wound up enjoying it again.
The Shaggy DA 1978 Based on the same novel by Felix Salten, screenplay by Don Tait and direction by Robert Stevenson.
The sequel has Tommy Kirk all grown up, now he's played by Dean Jones. Dean's married to Suzanne Pleshette and they have a little boy. Keenan Wynne is the town's District Attorney and the bad guy. He played that role in several previous Disney movies.
Tim Conway is the comic relief machine, he has the dog that Dean turns into, an ice cream truck with more than 39 flavors, and Jo Anne Worley as his girlfriend. She's in the roller derby. Some criminals are working the city pretty hard and Keenan is doing next to nothing. In fact, he's getting a cut from local fence Vic Tayback. Dick Van Patten is Keenan's henchman. Luckily they are all bunglers.
After his house is cleaned out Dean decides to run for DA and clean up the town. The crooks steal the ring and it starts working it's mojo while Dean is trying to get his campaign on. The sequel isn't as charming as the first movie, but it's still OK. I was still entertained and would watch the pair of them again.
The Ugly Dachshund 1966 Adapted from the novel of the same name by GB Stern, screenplay is by Albert Alley, direction by Norman Tokar. Albert wrote a whole lot of 60s and 70s TV, shows like Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, The Rifleman, Have Gun - Will Travel, Laramie, Rawhide, and The Magical World Of Disney. Norman started directing in TV with shows like The Bob Cummings Show, Leave It To Beaver and The Donna Reed Show. He started directing feature films for Disney with Big Red in 1963 and went on to direct over a dozen films for them. He directed 31 episodes of The Magical World Of Disney.
Dean Jones is an artist and Suzanne Pleshette is his wife, she's a stay at home wife and is totally fixated on her Dachshund. The dog they have is pregnant and vet Charlie Ruggles delivers the trio of pups. Dean takes a liking to the runt of the litter of the Great Dane that Charles has. It's been rejected by the mother who has too many pups for he milk supply so Dean sneaks it into the house claiming it was later delivery. Susanne figures it out after a couple of weeks and reluctantly lets Dean keep the dog he's named Brutus.
The Dachshund's are naughty and Brutus often gets unfairly blamed. He's no angel, his large size and playful attitude brings about a lot of destruction. It's all very slapsticky and destructive but there isn't much story other than the day to day at the house. Eventually Brutus saves one of the Dachshunds and he's now Suzanne's pal too. It's not quite as entertaining as the other two and I might skip when I watch the set again.
The Shaggy Dog 2006 Five people wrote the script and Brian Robbins directed. Brian directed Good Burger back in 1997 and I enjoyed that movie more than this one. I liked Ready To Rumble with David Arquette but not so much Norbit. He's produced a lot of TV and films.
I'm no fan of Tim Allen and he made me less interested in this movie all the way through. He's the assistant DA to Danny Glover and Kristin Davis is his wife. Robert Downey Jr has a dog stolen from a Chinese monastery, the dog has been alive for 80 years and he wants to know why. He's been experimenting on a long life serum with his Partner Phillip Michael Hall and they are using animals.
A local teacher is being tried for trying to free the animals and setting fire to the lab. Tim is working the case and his daughter is mad at him for taking the case. Tim gets bitten by the 80 year old dog and he starts turning into a dog but unlike the other films he doesn't merge with the existing dog. The two dogs are mistaken for each other throughout the film. Eventually things get sorted out and the villains are revealed.
There's plenty of slapstick and some jokes but I didn't find it more than about average. I'd probably skip it when I watch the first two movies.