Review of Marmaduke (2010) by Chads. — 04 Jun 2010
If Gabriele Muccino's "Seven Pounds" was a single-panel comic, and not a tear-jerking movie starring Will Smith, Rosario Dawson, and a Harlequin Great Dane named "Duke", maybe the strip would resemble "For Better or For Worse", the award-winning slice-of-life comic strip by Lynn Johnson, known for its realism, in which characters aged and sometimes died, like the Patterson family's sheepdog Farley, who drowned while saving four-year-old April.
In one conjectural edition of a "Seven Pounds" strip, the caption might go something like this: "Great Danes live only for seven years," as accompaniment to an illustration in which Emily tells Tim about Duke, while they all sit contemplatively in the long golden grass of an open field.
These gentle giants are fragile creatures, susceptible to gastric dilatation-volvulus(aka bloat), a stomach condition that's characterized by overstretching due to an accumulation of gas, a potentially fatal malady which can be exacerbated through overexertion.
Marmaduke(voiced by Owen Wilson), a Kansas hayseed new to the west coast, uses dogs; in particular, uses Maisy(voiced by Emma Stone), who helps the great dane court Jezebel(voiced by Fergie), a pedigreed collie(shades of "Some Kind of Ruff-derful"), as he climbs the social ladder, and in return, discards this motley assemblage of curs without any compunction for their feelings.
In actuality, hanging out with purebreds is advantageous for Marmaduke, independent of the cachet that goes along with being popular. Like juvenile delinquents who lure you into bad decisions, these mutts encourage the great dane to expend himself on a kinesis-based video game called Dance Storm.
While Marmaduke can recognize himself in the mirror, and TALK, he lacks the anthropomorphic capacity to discern his own mortality. On the other hand, as the conquering alpha male at the dog park, Marmaduke lounges around on a pedestal.
It's not snobbery; it's survival. Arguably, the mongerels are a bad influence. Even worse, Phil Winslow(Lee Pace), the dog's master, forces his pet on a longboard, and enters him in a surf contest.
It's no wonder that Marmaduke is flatulent. Played for laughs, the dog's farting is probably a symptom of bloat. Marmaduke is dying.
This review of Marmaduke (2010) was written by Chads. on 04 Jun 2010.
Marmaduke has generally received mixed reviews.
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