Reviews now on YouTube! | Watch here

Larsen On Film

  • Review Library
  • Subscribe
  • Why I’m Wrong
  • About
  • Books

Hotel for Dogs

Emma Roberts and Jake T. Austin play Andi and Bruce, an orphaned sister and brother who are stuck with a pair of wannabe rock star foster parents (Lisa Kudrow and Kevin Dillon). Looking for a place to hide their dog Friday, the siblings happen upon an abandoned hotel, which they turn into a haven for Friday and other strays. The hotel is only one instance of the picture’s impressive art direction and set design. A decrepit, Jazz Age palace, the place is strewn with cobwebs and period furniture, like a flophouse run by Dickens’ Miss Havisham. Better yet is the massive, imposing headquarters of the city’s animal control division, a municipal arm that apparently has more funding than the Department of Homeland Security. A big slab of concrete with a single, ostentatious yellow streak, it’s as if a Brutalist architect designed an IKEA store. What these background details point to is the amount of care that went into the project. Hotel for Dogs may be simple and juvenile, but it hasn’t been carelessly slapped together, as is so often the case with movies meant for kids.

Recent Reviews

M3GAN (2022)

Horror Rated PG-13

“… something like an American Girl doll who becomes the Evil Queen of Uncanny Valley.”

Materialists (2025)

Drama Rated R

“It’s not you, Dakota Johnson, it’s me.”

The Phoenician Scheme (2025)

Comedy Rated PG-13

“… unwisely asks Del Toro to conform to a particular Anderson type.”


Search Review Library

Sponsored by the following | become a sponsor



SUBSCRIBE


Sign up to receive emails

Sign up to get new reviews and updates delivered to your inbox!

Please wait...

Thank you for signing up!




FOLLOW ONLINE



All rights reserved. All Content ©2024 J. Larsen
maintained by Big Ocean Studios

TOP