Rover Dangerfield
Rover Dangerfield is an animated comedy film created by Warner Brothers and was released in 1991. The titular character, Rover Dangerfield is based on the popular real-life comedian, Rodney Dangerfield.
Plot
Rover is a Basset Hound that lives a life of luxury in Las Vegas with his owner Connie, a showgirl. He gambles and flirts with girls with his best friend Eddie. One night, he sees Connie's criminal boyfriend Rocky in a transaction with a pair of gangsters and accidentally disrupts it by dropping a bone into the meeting. Thinking that Rocky is an undercover cop setting them up, the gangsters flee as the big boss tells Rocky that he has blown his last chance as Rocky quotes that it's just a stupid dog outside. He throws the bone towards a fleeing Rover and Eddie.
The next day, Connie goes on tour for two weeks, leaving Rocky to look after Rover. In retaliation for ruining his deal, Rocky stuffs Rover in a bag, drives him to Hoover Dam and throws him into the water.
The bag is later pulled out of the water by two passing fishermen, who take Rover back to shore and place him in the back of their pickup truck. Rover regains consciousness and jumps out of the truck when the fishermen stop for gas, and begins to wander down the road. He ends up in the countryside, and eventually runs into a farmer, Cal, and his son, Danny, who convinces his father to take the dog in. Cal agrees on one condition: at the first sign of trouble, he'll be sent to an animal shelter. If nobody claims him, the animal shelter can put him down.
Rover has difficulty adjusting to life on the farm but with a help of Daisy, a beautiful collie next door, and the other dogs on the farm, he succeeds in earning their trust. Rover spends Christmas with the family, and begins to fall in love with Daisy, who returns his affections.
However, one night, a pack of wolves attempt to kill a turkey on the farm. As Rover attempts to save the turkey, the wolves run off, but the bird ends up dead and Cal mistakenly believes Rover to have been responsible. The next morning, Cal takes Rover into the woods to shoot him, but he hesitates and is attacked by the wolves. Rover manages to chase off the wolves, and rallies the other farm dogs to get the injured Cal home.
Rover's heroics make the papers, allowing Eddie and Connie to find out where he is. Danny informs Rover of his trip back to Las Vegas and he departs the farm. Although initially happy to be reunited with Connie and his friends, Rover soon begins to miss his life on the farm. When Rocky comes into Connie's dressing room, and upon seeing him, Rover initiates revenge. After Rocky accidentally confesses to what he did, Connie angrily punches him in the face and breaks up with him. Infuriated, Rocky tries to retaliate against Connie, but Rover and his dog friends chase him out of the casino, where a gangster beckons him into their limo. At first, Rocky is happy they saved him, but then questions their presence in the first place. The big boss quotes "This is a setup. Wanna see Hoover Dam?" The limo drive off with a horrified Rocky as Rover says his goodbyes to him.
Sometime later, Rover, missing Daisy, becomes depressed. Realizing he has met someone, Connie takes Rover back to the farm to stay and allows Cal and Danny to keep him this time. Rover is reunited with Daisy, who leads him to the barn and reveals to him that he is now a father, unveiling six puppies: Five of them resembles Rover and one resembles Daisy. The story ends with Rover teaching his kids how to play cards and playfully chasing Daisy around the farmyard.
Why This Film Does Not Make Us Laugh
- To address the elephant in the room: While the premise of making a popular comedian an animal and turning it into an animated movie is an interesting idea, in practices, it's a very odd concept as it's nothing more than a basic animated movie with a dog as a main protagonist, only with the main hero being based off of a popular comedian, therefor you can replace Rover with a different character that's not based off of Rodney Dangerfield, and the film would be the same.
- The plot of the movie is REALLY generic, as it's a very basic "Main character gets shipped off to another place, at first does not like it here but as time goes on, the main character grows to like that place and even chooses to live here.", most of which had already been done in previous media and handled way better back then.
- Rover himself is a very annoying and unlikable protagonist who constantly makes funny one-liners throughout the whole film, and despite his good-hearted nature, he can come across as very selfish, such as showing no concerns for Daisy when it's revealed that Connie, his owner, finds out where Rover is and is going to pick him up.
- While the animation is excellent and looks great for its time, there's some noticeable errors in the animation, one example is Rover's eyes, which look cross-eyed depending on the expression he makes.
- Very few locations, as there are only two major locations though the film, with most of it taking place at a farm.
- REALLY confusion on what tone Rover Dangerfield is going for, as it's way too cartoonish and lighthearted to be considered an adult movie, yet at the same time, there's way too much violence in a movie that's supposedly made for kids.
- Boring and uninspiring musical numbers.
- Very poor humor, with most of it infamously coming from Rover Dangerfield himself who as stated in the #3 segment, constantly makes one-liners throughout most of the film, and in short, he has a grand total of 3,422 one liners.
- Misleading poster:
- For one thing, the poster shows Rover in a barn, but the first third of the movie takes place in Las Vegas.
- Eddie, the little dog who is one of Rover's best friends, appears in the poster. yet he barely appears in the film, and is only shown in the first third of the film and the climax.
- Also in the poster, Eddie is shown in the barn with Rover, yet he never makes an appearance in the barn.
- Rocky is WAY to obvious that he's gonna be the main antagonist of the film, not to mention he barely appears in the film.
- On the subject of Rocky, some of the human characters in this film also look out-of-place, with characters such as Rocky and Connie in particular looking more realistic then most of the other human characters, and looking more like rejected "Marvel" characters.
- The characters are treated very poor for how their portrayed, Rover is treated as the "main hero" of the film despite barely doing anything until mid-way in the film during the scene were he rescues Cal from the wolves, and Rocky is treated as an antagonist even though he barely does anything evil throughout the movie and yet at the same time, he has no reason to be a villain in the first place, all Rocky just wants is money to impress Connie.
- There are multiple plot-holes throughout the film:
- Why couldn't Rocky just get a job to make money, rather then sell Connie's stuff?
- How stupid are the Gangsters to believe that a bone that falls and hits their lamp indicate that the cops are here?
- Why hasn't Connie realized that Rover's been out after nearly a few months?
- How did the sheep just RANDOMLY end up in a tree?
- What exactly happened to the turkey?
- Pacing of this film is very poor, as after Rover finds himself in a barn, most of the film just centers around Rover "adjusting" his life at a barn and being accustomed to his life at the barn, while it is heartwarming, the problem is that its takes up most of the film, it's only the mid-near the end of the film when the wolves attack where the film starts to get going.
- Despite Rover Dangerfield being classified as a "kids movie", there are many moments that are down-right violent, inappropriate, dark and even very disturbing.
- Rocky smokes on a cigar when he first appears as well as after Rover gets found by Connie.
- After the scene where Connie leaves on a tour, Rocky brutally abuses Rover and tries to kill him by stuffing Rover in a bag, drives him to Hoover Dam and throws him into the water.
- Perhaps the most infamous scene is mid-way where after the three wolves run away upon hearing Cal's gunfire, it's revealed that a turkey has already been killed and his corpse is then shown ON-SCREEN. Yet from how Rover tries to fiddle with it, it's treated as a funny moment.
- During the scene where Connie finds out about Rover being at a farm, one of the show girls bends down, exposing her butt.
- After Connie punches Rocky in the face after finding out that out that Rocky tried to kill Rover, Rocky grabs Connie and threatens to try and beat her up.
- Very odd sequence mid-way in the film, consisting of a large quantity of Rover and (insert character name here) scenes, ending not too long later thus making these scenes filler.
- The climax is super rushed as it only lasts for a few seconds, and Rocky's defeat is way too dark and out-of-place in a kids' film.
- Because of the poor pacing and very forced climax, Rover Dangerfield feels somewhat rushed, and makes this film feel like it was cutting corners during development.
Redeeming Qualities
- Despite the animation errors, the animation is beautiful and looks fantastic for its time.
- Decent voice acting.
- Depending on some viewers, the turkey scene could be considered funny.
- The soundtrack is decent.
Reception and Legacy
Rover Dangerfield received largely negative reviews from fans and critics alike. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 40% based on reviews from 5 critics, with an average rating of 3.80/10. Entertainment Weekly graded the film a 'C', questioning Dangerfield's decision to make the film and said, 'Dangerfield should have known he had written a no-win scenario. His strongest suit — that gleeful lounge-act vulgarity — has always been a little too crass for kids. Yet when Rover offers gooey, sentimental life lessons, it feels unconvincing, like a rock star in a suit. This mongrel-movie badly wants to be a kidvid hit, and with that star and decent animation chops, it stands a chance. But don't bet the farm on it.' TV Guide awarded the film two stars, criticizing the tone and inconsistent animation, and said, 'The result is a confused hybrid creation, suspended in a twilight zone between Don Bluth's benign but dull children's fare and Ralph Bakshi's gratingly hip work.'
Screen Rant listed Rover Dangerfield as one of his must-see performances stating that:
"To hear Dangerfield voice an animated version of himself is quite funny, and the film, while no classic, is completely watchable due to Dangerfield's fresh and entertaining voice-performance".