The Painted Hills Review


It’s time for another Lassie film and of course you know that means that the movie won’t be particularly good. Lassie movies tend to fall into the same holes time and time again. You want them to be good but deep down you just know that they won’t be. It’s unfortunate but that’s just how it goes. This one is another particularly weak installment and the whole time you’re waiting for Lassie to show up.

The film opens up with Jonathan and his dog Shep travelling through the mountains and finding a gold vein. They might be rich now! They head back to town to let Martha and her kid Tommy know but unfortunately a guy named Lin hears about it. Lin has always been a decent guy and he convinces Jonathan not to put a claim in just yet so they can make sure of what they’ve got first. Jonathan unfortunately listens to the guy and they head back up. Lin gets crazier and crazier about the gold until he finally murders Jonathan and decides to take it all for himself. He even poisons Shep and tries to bump him off. Will the guy face justice or is it all over for the heroes?

Obviously it’s sad for Jonathan but my main problem with the guy is that the whole thing is so obvious and predictable. How did he not suspect that Lin would do this? Lin was not hiding his greed at all. Not even for a microsecond was the guy staying sane after he saw the gold. He was quick to attack anybody and so Jonathan should have taken care of him sooner. Instead Jonathan talked about the rules of the mountain and how there was an honor code. A lot of good an honor code does you once you’re dead!

He had the foresight to give the kid Tommy the claim so that the government could get involved but still went up the mountain with Lin upon his request? That’s just not a smart move at all and it makes sense that he would be pushed. I’ll be less harsh with the dog Shep for eating the poison but to be honest even he should have known better. Lin is not someone who can be trusted and Shep knows pretty well that Lin is the one who bumped off his owner. This calls for drastic action, not simply going along with all of this. Shep does well in the end but it took a while to take care of Lin.

Tommy also didn’t look particularly good here. He knows for a fact that Lin bumped Jonathan off and tries to escape only to hit his head really hard and get gaslit into basically staying silent and not saying anything for a while. Tommy handled the situation as poorly as possible and it was all pretty disgraceful. I expected much better from the kid but he disappointed me in the end. I know he’s just a kid but we’re talking life or death here, you can’t be letting yourself go down so easily. At the very least he could have said that Lin was trying to murder him and beating him in a more convincing way.

Even punch yourself real quick if that’s what it takes and leave a bruise or something. The other adults were slow to believe him which is annoying but makes sense with Tommy shooting himself in the foot the whole time. As for Lin, well he definitely didn’t cover his tracks well so he shouldn’t have even lasted as long as he did. He’s just lucky that things kept on working out for him but the film can’t say it was so lucky. At the end of the day we had to go through more animal violence here as Lassie is poisoned and shot at.

The dogs always have a really rough time of it and while some of the other Lassie films have been more violent, this one’s still going too far. No reason Shep should have to go through all of this and the film as a whole isn’t super interesting. I’ve seen better films about people being corrupted due to the gold. In this case I wouldn’t even say it is corrupted though as the guy seemed shady from the start. The gold was just his excuse to get really crazy about the whole thing.

The first red flag should have been the whole reason not to put in a claim. He talks about how other people would go to the mountains to dig and ignore the law anyway. Sure that might happen but at least you’ve got the law on your side and by the time other people discover the spot you should have gotten most of the gold anyway. It didn’t feel like a real argument although Jonathan believed it so I suppose there had to be something to it.

The guy was just too trusting. Even with how casual he was about another guy walking over and helping himself to things within the house. Apparently on the mountains it is a tradition where this one guy will show up to cook a good meal and then leave. While Lin’s response was off the rails crazy, I would be a bit weirded out as well if someone was just randomly in my house. Back in the days of everybody carrying guns, I could see this being fatal real quickly as well. You don’t know what’s going on and only have half a second to react after all.

Overall, The Painted Hills is a film I would definitely avoid. None of the characters are smart at all and fall for the easiest traps. Once you are on a horse there’s no way a villain should catch you and yet Tommy manages to find a way. Lin should have been taken out way sooner and needs all the plot armor in the world to stay on top. Not a very good look for him at all. There’s also the whole irony of Lassie not even being in the film since Shep is a descendent. A very odd choice without a doubt. I don’t think the film would have been good either way but it doesn’t help matters.

Overall 3/10

Challenge to Lassie Review


It’s time for another Lassie film and this one is definitely ready to give you that emotional punch. Fortunately it focuses on the humans taking their Ls again instead of Lassie which is definitely the right way to approach it. It certainly works for me at least although Lassie still does get injured a bit here and there with all of the big jumps. I would say that it doesn’t end up beating the last film but still beats the average Lassie experience.

The movie starts by showing us how a guy named Jack raised Lassie for a long while. She was a small pup at first and then gradually grew into full size. She had a really good upbringing and it all turned out well but Jack was an old man. He was already breaking down and it only got worse when he was beat up by a bunch of thugs. That really accelerated things and he ends up dying. This forces his friend John to look after Lassie but it won’t be easy. She wants to always be with his grave but the grave is located among church grounds where dogs are not allowed. Now the cops have been alerted and since John has no formal license to Lassie, she is in a lot of trouble and may get the death penalty. Can’t anything be done?

I would say the weakest part of the film is how a lot of the characters are super unreasonable. This is a dog after all and a rather harmless one at that. The whole putting him to sleep business makes no real sense. They try to explain how it is necessary because that’s just how the law is, but it feels rather forced the whole time. There is no real reason to be this stringent about it. When the kids ask the judge about why he has to pass the law, the guy can barely even answer. Deep down he also knows that this is all a bunch of nonsense.

The basis of the law is that because John doesn’t have the license, he isn’t able to get one after the fact. Instead of waiting the usual 3 days for someone to pick up the dog, they can skip right to the execution. It’s a case of the process being put ahead of the logic which is where the whole thing breaks down. If a rule doesn’t make sense then you have to find a way to agree with it or just ignore it entirely. Now you do have to put some real effort into understanding the law first as you shouldn’t just break laws that you disagree with but this was a very clear example.

So I can’t say that I really liked any of the policemen or judges here. Then you have the church personnel who aren’t the best here. At least the big preacher at the end seemed reasonable and wouldn’t rat him out but the main guy wasn’t the nicest. You can understand why Lassie wouldn’t be allowed on the church grounds since there could be a lot of cleanliness issues but in this case you should just move the body then. Put it somewhere where Lassie could visit it and you would solve all of the problems at once.

I’ll give John credit for fighting pretty hard to save Lassie the whole time. He went to court and risked his reputation the whole time as well. It’s definitely not something that just anyone can do. His son the young lawyer was also pretty solid here. There were a lot of limitations on what he could really do before he was fully certified but he was always ready to help as well. Even the kids weren’t bad here as they were all on Lassie’s side. It was nice to see the whole community supporting him like that.

As I noted earlier, an issue is that Lassie still goes through a certain amount of grief. It’s nothing as crazy as in the earlier films but she is pushed to her physical limit the whole time as she has to scale mountains and constantly be on the run. You can’t forget the emotional burdens as she wants to be with the old owner the whole time and keeps on being prevented from doing so. Her dedication was definitely second to none but of course those scenes aren’t very fun.

That is a common theme with a lot of the Lassie films which is that they generally aren’t very fun to watch. This one has some fun dialogue and reasonable characters but it is mainly lacking a big hook. One framing device that could have really helped it would have been to have the film start in the court-room and have that continue as the present throughout the movie. We then see the scenes spread across as several flashbacks. Have more and more of the characters enter the court room as witnesses and then we see the scenes from their perspective. It would have turned this into more of a courtroom thriller film which always tends to work pretty well. It would have given the movie a bit of a boost.

Overall, Challenge to Lassie is a decent film for the most part but I wouldn’t say there is much reason to watch it. In some ways the last one is still a more satisfying overall picture with Lassie mainly getting the sweet end of things. In this one, Lassie may avoid a lot of the physical trauma of the original films but still has to deal with the emotional trauma of the fallout that occurs from the owner dying. It’s not like he returns at the end or anything like that so in the end it’s still a net loss for her. The fact that she still goes to the grave every evening to mourn also shows that she isn’t really over the loss and perhaps never will be. I like to think that eventually she would change and not have to visit the grave but it’s hard to say. Either way if you’ve seen all of the Lassie films then you may as well check this one out. Otherwise you can give it a skip.

Overall 5/10

The Sun Comes Up Review


It’s time for another Lassie title! This may be the best out of all the Lassie films which may not be saying much…but we take those. I was a little unsure of how to score the film at first because it can be a little dull but does avoid most of the negatives. I had a good enough time with it. It’s not really the kind of film that you would go back and rewatch to be honest but you don’t have to re watch everything right?

The movie starts with some singing as Helen reminds the world why she is a premiere singer. Her skills continue to amaze the world and things are going well until her son is destroyed by an incoming truck. Helen retreats to the country-side and takes a break from singing. Initially she is going to ditch her dog Lassie but is forced o take her in. Helen doesn’t want to be around kids anymore since they all bring back her ptsd but she is shamed and pressured into letting the kids hang around. Will this town break her spirits until she is back to normal or will she go back to singing in order to leave this place behind?

Most of the film is really about Helen desperately trying to fit in no matter what she has to do. Whether it is driving the kids around or memorizing lines that the shop owner gives her in order to fit in, Helen is ready. At the same time, it can also be a little annoying because she is constantly doing everything to please them and it feels a little overdone. It would have been better if she could have been herself and they would gradually get used to her instead. I would also say it’s a bit rough that even to the very end she was planning on leaving the town never to return and didn’t even tell anybody. That’s a pretty big knock against her.

Also, the town is one of those old fashioned places where they figure even the quickest show of friendship means that a romance has to happen. A neighbor puts a lot of pressure on Helen because she didn’t immediately start dating the landlord when he showed up. I suppose normal friendships between adults just can’t be a thing right? The adults were definitely annoying here and the fact that the neighbors initially gave Helen the silent treatment instead of talking to her also comes off as rather petty.

Even the shop owner, who was the most entertaining character wasn’t the nicest one. Quickly letting the cat out of the bag to intentionally force a problem wasn’t a great move. I cut him a lot of slack though since Helen’s decision to keep everyone in the dark was even worse. We do have a dramatic fire at the end to allow the situation to work out for the characters but otherwise I’m sure there would have still been a lot of sore feelings around.

Naturally I didn’t like Jerry either. Definitely an annoying character who was always running off and making things even worse. He constantly panicked and he was also quick to forget his chores and cause problems for Lassie. Jerry needed to be better at clock management and making sure he took care of his responsibilities. It may be a hard thing to hear but at the end of the day, that is what is to be expected. So Jerry just kept sinking the more that the film went on.

Meanwhile the songs aren’t particularly good but that is to be expected when you see that the tag is part musical. It’s well known that musicals tend to have songs that aren’t as good as standard or concert type titles. Musicals are the weakest link after all and these songs will have you shaking your head. Okay most of this sounds really negative so what are the positives? Well, for one thing the movie plays it pretty safe like I said. There aren’t any real bad scenes or moments where Lassie is put through the wringer. This time the humans are given all of the trauma which is absolutely the right way to go about it. I’d prefer the humans have to take the Ls over the animals any day. That’s the right way to do it.

While I didn’t love any of the characters, the writing is good enough so they don’t get too far onto your nerves. The film is short so the pacing is reasonable. In some ways the film has aged a bit too hard in the wrong directions like Helen being such a passive main character but it is also nice to see a small town where everybody just helps each other. So there are some positives about the case like that. Lassie may not be the biggest character here but it’s the first time we see her having fun the whole time which is really nice.

Perhaps the final important thing to note is that it’s just an easy film to watch. You can plug it in any time as a pleasant watch to have in the background. It can be a little boring at times but sometimes you need an uneventful film to unwind with. The film could have probably added some kind of a rude townsperson to add some drama though and that could have helped to elevate things a bit. A lot of what ifs to think about but at the end of the day, this film destroys the average Lassie film and that’s something to be proud of.

Overall, The Sun Comes Up has its share of weaknesses but in the end it is still a good film. The main moral I would give here is that when you’re trying to move on from something, a new environment may actually be a bad thing since you won’t have much time to yourself. Ultimately things worked out for Helen but the town didn’t always make this easy. She had to deal with quite a lot of people the whole time.

Overall 6/10

Hills of Home Review


You ever start watching a film and almost immediately start thinking to yourself, “Get this stuff off of my screen!!?” Well that is what happens with this film as it is definitely a thumbs down almost immediately. It makes every kind of mistake in the book as it puts Lassie through way too much. There aren’t really any redeeming values to be had with this film and so it ends up being a heavy thumbs down. Definitely a title that you will want to skip at all costs.

The movie starts by showing us that Lassie is on tough times as she is owned by a rather cruel owner. He traumatizes her into being deathly afraid of the water and fortunately her next owner ends up being a doctor named William. He is kinder but also in a rush and initially tries to sell Lassie off. Fortunately his conscience wins out and he keeps her. William is pretty busy as the only doctor around with a never ending stream of patients. He is getting older too but the guy doesn’t complain about it and just keeps on working as hard as he can. Will he be able to cure Lassie of her fears or is this one mission that will be too difficult even for him?

I won’t say that he’s a perfect character though because he does betray Lassie a few times here. Aside from selling her the first time, he also yells at her at different occasions and isn’t very patient with her fears. You would think as a doctor that he would know how difficult these things can be to get over but instead he doesn’t act all that sympathetic. He’s a fun enough character when it comes to interacting with the other humans, he just doesn’t seem like he’s the biggest dog person.

He’s also not that smart as he lets one of his “friends” get away with not paying him back on a lot of loans and then being tricked with Lassie. For starters that isn’t a good friendship and he probably should have asked for some serious money in the end. He let the guy get off easy despite being a major thorn throughout the whole movie. The guy’s son is an aspiring doctor to be but the path forward is made a lot more difficult because of this guy’s objections. Basically the way I would explain it is that the father is very old fashioned in an annoying way.

The aspiring doctor Tammas is okay but way too soft spoken and doesn’t really stand his ground. He gets pushed around so easily and so I never really grew to like the guy all that much. He’s okay at best but that’s a main problem for the film as a whole. The characters don’t really stick out and can come across as boring. You certainly aren’t all that invested in any of the characters, I can tell you that much. They come and go without a ton of impact.

As for Lassie, well like I said the film is rather brutal to her the whole time. It’s just so mean spirited and you get the feeling that none of the characters really knew how to handle a dog both in and out of the movie. Whether it’s Lassie being forced to lay down and clearly not wanting to or the whole water trauma moments, it’s all rather distasteful and holds the film back in a massive way. Even throwing in the big time skip at the end as if this was an anime could not save the film. That’s because there was no saving it by that point.

The writing itself isn’t terrible I suppose. We have some nice dialogue at times but there just isn’t much of a point to it all. Even for a complete slice of life film, you are expecting some dynamics to keep you interested and things like that. Instead you have nothing to hold your interest until the storms start setting in. Even when characters get sick you find it hard to care because of how unlikable they are.

Put it this way, even if we remove all of the animal violence, this film would have been probably stuck around a 5-6. It’s just not interesting enough and I tend to enjoy old time films like this one. Well, this time it wasn’t enough to carry the film which is a really big blow. In my opinion it’s not very hard to make very compelling characters in a setting like this. You just have to make them likable so they shouldn’t be doing anything crazy.

The movie is also fairly short even if it can feel long at times. So there isn’t a ton to talk about here beyond what we’ve already gone over. I suppose the final thing is that if you live by a road that is submerged during all big storms, you should probably have a better backup route rather than trying to swim through with your horse. That just seems like a terribly dangerous way to do this and there has to be a better way. There just has to be, because with this way people are going to die sometimes. I didn’t blame the big city doctor for panicking because the whole thing seemed absolutely crazy.

Overall, Hills of Home is definitely a film to stay far away from. It’s incredibly mean spirited and doesn’t really have anything to it. All of the characters have moments where they are acting like big jerks and you get the feeling that they all probably hate each other. After all you don’t just forget the comments so quickly. Whether it was one wife blaming the doctor for not doing well enough, another guy saying his new method for knocking out someone was terrible, everyone laughing at him at the bar, etc.; they were all taking some major shots here. Lassie doesn’t really get the respect that she deserves at any point which is a shame.

Overall 2/10

Courage of Lassie Review


The Lassie films have a long standing reputation of all being rather bad so the question was if this one could finally change things. Well, I am here to report that it could not change thing at all. This is one title that does not surpass its limits or do anything even like that. Instead, it just repeats all of the same mistakes that you are used to seeing from the franchise. It’s unfortunate but not really unexpected. No, if anything you are used to it and we’ll just have to keep on waiting for a good one.

The main dog in this film is named Bill and he’s a nice dog. Bill is a strong dog who can run around a lot but his owners don’t think that he has what it takes to shepherd the sheep when the going gets tough. Kathie wants to prove the world wrong and runs around with Bill to try and prove her point. It was a good attempt at least. Unfortunately Bill is often the subject of bad luck. Over the course of the movie he is run over, shot with a gun, and even gets drafted into the army. While in the army, Bill is sent to an active warzone with bombs flying all over and he gets injured enough to the point where he develops PTSD.

His owner also goes too far in trying to win the day and has Bill continue to move even while he is super injured. This doesn’t help things out either. Bill then becomes so wild that he eats/injures other animals and a warrant is put out for his death. Yeah this dog can’t catch a break. You get the feeling that the film really wanted to up the stakes as much as possible and show how this wasn’t your average Lassie film but my answer to that is it just makes this one that much more. It’s a Lassie film so you are expecting the dog to get shot but why go through all of this other hardship as well?

It makes the whole film rather try hard and edgy. You really didn’t need to see any of that. The drama doesn’t make the film any more engaging or anything. It just holds it back. With this level of animal violence the film never stood a chance. Meanwhile it’s also no that interesting. None of the characters really glue you o the screen. The main character is Kathie and while she means well, she’s too young to do much of anything. Like when Bill is taken away to the army, there is noting she can do. She doesn’t even know what happened to Bill after he vanished for a while there. Then when Kathie does reappear with Bill, one of the first things she does is accidentally disclose his position to the cops which almost proves fatal for Bill.

Naturally it’s not like that’s really her fault as she couldn’t have known but it’s hardly a great look for her either. Then for Bill’s owner at the army, I didn’t like him for the reasons I mentioned earlier. Having Bill continue to fight when he was so injured was not a good look. Bill needed to lie down and recharge, not get right back on the saddle like this. The only decent character was the old man who tried keeping Kathie calm and then tried keeping Bill as a secret in the end. He was old enough to know how the world works and wasn’t just spilling his guts about everything. The guy knew how to keep a secret.

Still, it’s a rather low bar for characters. This is definitely not the kind of film where you expect great characters or anything like that but even more decent ones would have helped. I suppose at best the writing is decent. The characters still talk in the old fashioned way that is always fun. I also thought that the pacing was fairly reasonable. They manage to squeeze in a lot of different locations and characters into a film that’s not overly long or anything. So the movie really knew how to balance its time effectively. It just didn’t have a great story to accompany it.

Now when a film has lost the plot as badly as this one has, I like to add some some advice for how the film could have succeeded. Okay so hear me out, you cut out all injuries that happened to Bill in this film right. Have him go missing one day and so the main characters have to try and find him. Ultimately they end up finding him helping out the US army in bomb detection or something. They take Bill back home as a hero and that’s the movie. It’s still wholesome and has the army subplot and everything. It just ends up being a much more light hearted movie with great moments rather than trying so hard to be a suspenseful tragedy. We don’t need any of those. Extra bonus if you make the main character Lassie instead of Bill since that would work a lot better.

Overall, There’s not a whole lot to say about this film beyond that. It follows through the Lassie formula to the point where this might as well be an edgy reboot. Even the whole joining the army thing has already been done before. I don’t get why the series doesn’t just make a movie that’s all slice of life. Lets just see Lassie running around town and having fun. Yes, Lassie, not some future descendent named Bill. Doesn’t that completely take away from the point of the series? I’m watching the movie to see Lassie, not another dog. I dare say that the title is really clickbait. Yeah you can use it to tie into things later but it’s click bait because the first assumption with that title is that Lassie will be appearing. Definitely skip this film as quickly as you can.

Overall 2/10

Son of Lassie Review


It’s no surprise that I didn’t really like the first Lassie movie. In fact it was pretty awful now that I think about it. It’s just not really my kind of film and the sequel is better but still pretty bad. You have the dog still getting shot and some general animal violence. It isn’t in the same level as the first film of course but why can’t we just have a happy dog film instead? That’s what the people want and most importantly, it’s what I want! Seriously just think about it, this has potential to be as big as Air Bud but instead the film ends up being more of a miss. Also more than the first film it just feels a bit aimless at times.

The movie starts off by introducing us to Laddie, the son of Lassie. This guy is really aggressive and doesn’t play by the rules. This often frustrates the Duke because Laddie messes up the flowers. Laddie’s owner Joe doesn’t really care all that much though because he correctly realizes that Laddie is just having a lot of fun. Well Joe gets drafted into war so he heads out while Laddie is to finally be trained professionally. The owners underestimate him though and Laddie travels across the country to find Joe. Looks like Laddie will be having a spot in this war after all but is it really safe for him?

I wouldn’t say the film has a huge plot beyond that though. A good chunk of the adventure is Laddie running after Joe, being taken back home, then finding him again, etc. It’s really a cycle that just keeps on going over and over again. Sure by the end we actually get to meet the enemies and Laddie gets to prove his stuff but that’s the very end of the film. For the most part it was relatively aimless until then.

Also Joe doesn’t make for a very compelling main character. Everyone’s always insulting him all the time and he typically doesn’t really notice or react. Intentionally not reacting to a diss is absolutely a good skill but the problem is that I’m not sure if he even notices so that’s not a good look there. You really need to be ready for action at all times and the digs aren’t exactly subtle either. So if you don’t recognize that then we have some problems. His lack of confidence is also huge.

He likes this one girl and she basically tells him to confess several times and it takes a lot to force it out of him. The guy’s just way too nervous and always running off. Some guys can be shy sure, but this was a bit much. You’re just cringing the whole time. The whole romance isn’t particularly good but it’s not a big part of the film anyway so I suppose it doesn’t have a huge impact. It’s just part of a bigger problem which is that any scene with Joe is brutal. The guy also had no plan when he was taken at gunpoint in the climax and Laddie had to do all the work.

I always say if it’s life or death what do you have to lose? In this case the villain is walking Joe up a cliff so that he can be shot and fall into the abyss. Joe knows that, the villain knows that, and I know that. So why would you possibly just keep walking up and wait to get shot? Lunge at the guy, go for the gun etc. What’s he gonna do…shoot you? Well that’s going to happen anyway so you might as well take a chance. It’s not like this is a scenario where you only might get shot. The guy made is clear that Joe has to be exterminated so that’s really it. You have to try and fight back while you still can. Definitely a pretty brutal moment for good ole Joe.

Still, like I said the main problem here is that the film can just be rather boring. The story can barely last 40 minutes, let alone the full length of the title. We probably should have focused more on training scenes or maybe even some military battles. You needed more plots or some kind of hook to pull this off. That being said, I was glad that Joe didn’t go with the other guy’s plan to hit Laddie. That would have been absolutely awful so in all of my bashing of the guy, he got that part right.

There’s really not a whole lot to even talk abut with this film in the end. I guess we can say there was a lot of plot armor in nobody being able to stop Laddie from travelling cross country each time. You’d think the characters would learn and keep the leash on each time but Laddie was always a few steps ahead of them. I would have liked the Duke to have appeared more since he’s always the most enjoyable character but he doesn’t do a whole lot here after the intro scenes. Lassie herself also doesn’t have a big role.

Having her step in to save the day would have been a clever way to get some excitement in here. Actually it’ such a great idea that I’m surprised they didn’t do it. Lassie doesn’t have any of the huge pivotal roles you would expect from the old main character appearing in the sequel. It’d be like if Naruto didn’t do much in Boruto or if Goku was slacking off in Super. Lassie should still be the one making a big play now and then even if Laddie is the one with the final moment.

Overall, Son of Lassie is just not a very interesting film. Mix in the animal violence and it was really out of its depth. I think there is probably a great film mixed in there somewhere…but it’s very deep in there so that’s not going to be all that helpful tbh. In the end a dog film should be a fairly upbeat one where the dog isn’t in any danger. Sure that can be boring if handled wrong but it’s all up to the writers. Surely you should be able to make a film that is still really interesting even without that right? If you can’t…well I guess now we’ve got a real problem now don’t we?

Overall 3/10

Air Bud vs Lassie



Suggested by Destroyer This is Air Bud’s closest fight yet. Lassie is a fairly tough dog as well and in terms of size is very comparable to Air Bud. Lassie may even be a bit larger and has better durability feats. The reason I give this to Air Bud though are his sport feats. He will be able to out speed Lassie and ultimately go for the win with his superior strength. It’s close but Bud’s got this all the way. Air Bud wins.