With a movie based around dogs running a gambling (rat races) and bar joint, it already earns coolness factor among children's fare. As a child of about 9 when this movie was originally released (ten years ago) these references went straight over my head. Strangely the movie is still entertaining, although slipping a bit into typical heartwarming stuff after the introduction of the little girl into the mix (who is being held by Charlie's - the German Shephard-like lead dog voiced wonderfully by Burt Reynolds - nemesis, Carface because she can talk to animals and thus know who will win the day's race.)

Set in New Orleans, the main plot (which the rest is filler really) is Charlie and his partner Itchy return to the joint that Charlie and Carface used to run together (up until Charlie was thrown into the clinker - the dog pound - until Itchy got him out, the great escape is where the movie begins) and under the guise of helping Charlie set up his own place, Carface holds a party at Mardi Gras where Charlie gets a little too sloshed and makes him an easy target for a cleancut murder. All dogs go to heaven of course despite the fact there's little record of our lead actually doing any good in his earthly canine life, but heaven wasn't good enough for Charlie, he wants revenge, so he steals his watch of life, winds it back up and heads back down for Vengeance upon the ones who has done him wrong. That's when his life gets entangled with the little orphan girl (called "Squeaker" by him through most of the movie after a rather cute scene which I won't spoil here), who he 'rescues' for 'using' her for his own selfish purposes instead of helping the child realize her dreams, but his coming to care for her in turn ends up leading to his own true salvation.

A very 'dark' film, in lighting and sometimes even in story, there's many morals to be found underneath, the biggest being that even imperfect people (or animals) have goodness in their heart, they only have to reach out and open their hearts to find it. The badguys are truly bad although the lead villan's Chihuahua looking scrapgoat shows a kinder side sometimes, and are played out kind of like mobsters and not too over-the-top. There are no ridiculous ambitions, simply the doing in of Charlie so that his claim to the business is his void (he'd be dead afterall), which is a refreshing pace from superhero movies. The voice acting is very good in most cases, and a couple of the songs don't even make adults cringe too much (especially the one in heaven is quite nice).

A well done film throughout, which spawned a mediocre sequel and animated series. However, there's no substitute for the original, which is one of the best animated movies to come out of the 90s period. Children will love it, and adults will be able to watch it without feeling too ill or out of place, and those that grew up on it, probably still hold it close to their hearts.