Snow Buddies (2008)

People are voting emotionally.

A waste of 90 minutes of my life

The first must-see film of the year.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Everyone's favorite golden retriever puppies are back again.In Fernfield, Washington right before Christmas, the puppies are out playing and having a good time. B-Dawg makes the mistake of chasing a kitten, whose mom is the angry Himalayan Miss Mittens. One of the other puppies sees an open ice cream truck, so they all have to sneak in and have a treat. B-Dawg watches for humans. But he too must hide when Miss Mittens shows up, so our adventure begins.It seems the ice cream is headed for Ferntiuktuk, Alaska, home of a legendary dog sled race. And our heroes are trapped.In Alaska, Adam wants to race like his father Joe, who also runs the local general store. But Joe says it's too dangerous. And he lost some of his dogs when they fell through the ice the last time he raced. Among those dogs were the parents of Shasta.Adam is good at hockey--if you're on the other team--and he is less than a model student. But we later see that if he really wants to do something, he is very determined and a hard worker. He makes a wish that he can have five more puppies to join Shasta.Christmas arrives and there are five very sad children in Washington. The parents Buddy and Molly make an effort to find their puppies.Adam is sad too when he opens his presents, but there is a special surprise later, which he must keep hidden from his parents. Yes, somehow the shipment with the puppies ended up out in the middle of nowhere and they couldn't understand why it was so cold and why the world was covered in vanilla ice cream which didn't taste very good. But Shasta rescued them, and all is well. Believe it or not, Adam is going to train these dogs to enter the race.With the help of Talon, a wise old husky, he just might do it. And this implausible plot line can only succeed because of the kindly but incompetent Sheriff Ryan, whose trained rescue dog is St. Bernie.But there are many obstacles. Among them are the evil villain Jean Georges, last year's winner, who admits he won only because Joe lost his dogs. Francois and Phillipe are Jean Georges' mean dogs that taunt the puppies and remind them that if by some miracle they make it into the race, they will not win! Other competitors come from Iceland, Russia and Japan. Jean Georges has no morals and will do what he can to sabotage their efforts.So will Adam race? Will he win? What do YOU think? This is part of the Buddies series, after all.This is no masterpiece, and you shouldn't look for great acting, though Kris Kristofferson impressed, on the same day he and other country music legends performed at The Grammys. Charles Stevenson as the bumbling sheriff is also quite good.John Kapelos as the villain is the only human here who is genuinely a cartoon.The dogs are very intelligent. But it's more than a little obvious several dogs play each part. And some of the dogs don't look quite real. But a lot is demanded of them.There are a couple of "only in Hollywood" moments where a kid proves he can accomplish a lot.Other than that, you pretty much know what to expect. But I can't say anything negative. if you're a kid, it's great. And there's nothing offensive, except for some potty humor that apparently qualifies as G-rated these days, and some minor but necessary violence in a race with an evil villain.If you already enjoyed the Buddies series (and I did, even though I don't like dogs), you'll surely like it. If not, and especially if you don't care for kids' movies, well ...

I personally don't know if the puppies died or not, it's just what people are saying on the forums.This time around The puppies and their love for adventure ends them up in the back of an ice cream truck. The ice cream truck's shipment is put into a plane and dropped in Alaska. The puppies meet a husky pup named Shasta and they find that the dog's owner, young Adam has prayed hard for 5 more puppies so he can start a dog sled team. Must I go on, yes they race, they win, their owners in Washington come up there and find them and it's all happy endings...Bonus though, NO ONE is trying to kidnap them this time.This was just another film, exploitation Disney style - this is part 7 of the series and it is fine for kids I suppose, but I think adults are getting rather tired of them coming out. If your kid has air buddies he can stop there because they get worse as it goes along. C.G.I. effects and talking puppies get old very quickly.This movie is set around Christmas as many of the other Air Bud films are. There is a dog mentioned on here named Nanook, and thats an obvious reference to Corey Haim's Husky in The Lost Boys movie from 1987. One stupid thing is that two Huskys had died in a previous race on this film, Shastas parents, yet race 2 is in the same location and the bad guy gets his dogs stuck there. Why would anyone race in a place that is an obvious danger zone...these Air Bud movies are full of little flaws like that.Robert Vince is back again as director and he is nothing special, his whole career has been exploiting various animals for his films. His C.G.I. effects are hard to set through at times. Acting wise, most of the cast was back, Richard Karn as well as all of the kids except the main kid, Noah. The adult dogs, Buddy and Molly were back being voiced again by Tom Everett Scott and Molly Shannon. Whoopie Goldberg voices a cat, James Belushi voices a dog and Kris Kristopherson voices Talon, a huge Husky and that dog even resembles Kris.Jus another crazy talking animal movie that will shut your kids up for 80 minutes. 2/10 stars

In film history, there have been several franchises in which the first film was great or decent, and the next five, six, or seven installments made no sense and were absolutely dreadful. Walt Disney's Snow Buddies falls into this category. Another spin-off of the Air Bud films, this is one film your dog-loving daughter may enjoy, but will give you torture.The story involves Air Bud's five pups as they sneak into an ice cream delivery truck and are shipped to Alaska. The pups meet an Alaskan pup, which leads to a sub-plot, then back to the story, then the sub-plot, until that sub-plot is intertwined into the main story. By then you'll have no interest whatsoever about what happens to these pups and will constantly be checking the time, waiting for an end.Looking at the cast, I was surprised to see talents Whoopi Goldberg and James Belushi were wasted in such a time-killer. Snow Buddies lacks the humor and charm that make family films enjoyable, or at least bearable to watch. All Snow Buddies does is pile on the clichés, cheap jokes, and laughably bad performances to make you wish you had 90 minutes of your life back.

I am stumped as to why the now talking puppies are exported to Alaska. And in this alternate reality, the Iditarod has been replaced by a dog sled race that takes all of two days to complete. And yet, it supposed to be the greatest and most dangerous dog sled race in all of Alaska. Yeah sure.Somehow, according to this cutsie movie, the parent dogs follow them to Alaska. And they find them after the dog race it over. But the dumb thing is, the kid and the puppies won the race? How corny is that? Full grown dog sled teams and adults are bested by a ordinary kid and some puppies.This really wasn't worth Richard Karn's weight in gold. So, look someplace else for a good movie. "F"