Strays

This review may contain spoilers!

 

Strays follows Reggie, a dog owned by an abusive owner who endeavours to ditch our canine protagonist after receiving an eviction notice. After becoming a stray dog Reggie realises how awful Doug, hiw owner, has been to him and teams up with a group of new friends to hunt down Doug and bite his dick off. Yes, really. The thing I love about this film so much is the complete sense of parody it has as a concept. We've all grown up with the classic dog story, especially the dog films that are narrated from the dog's perspective as it does everything within it's power to help it's owner. The film opens with Reggie's incessant optimistic worldview in the face of a world that is giving him no love, it's a fun twist on the dog film narrative which makes this a really novel watch at first. I also found the ending somewhat grimly satisfying, with the overall conclusion being a light moment with a very feel good message.

 

I also thought that the soundtrack for the film bolstered the comedy of the piece often, especially the use of Miley Cyrus' 'Wrecking Ball'. That one track turned what could have been a horrifying moment to a somewhat well-deserved climactic end for Strays.

 

Will Ferrell, who voiced Reggie, does such a great job as the upbeat protagonist of the film; Ferrell really sells his character as the more innocent one taking in the world for the first time. Jamie Foxx, who voiced Bug, really gets to stretch his comedic legs here and I greatly enjoyed that; Foxx just goes at his line delivery with such energy that really ranges from frantic to enthusiastic. Isla Fisher, who voiced Maggie, seems quite proper when first you meet her as far as domesticated dogs go; yet I was really entertained by how 'off the leash' Fisher took the role the further away from her owner this role got. Randall Park, who voiced Hunter, is exceptional at an awkward deadpan delivery; Park makes Hunter a really wilting unconfident presence which is so great given the dog's big size. Will Forte, who played Doug, might just be the best comedy antagonist we'll get this year; Forte's ability to craft a being who is so reprehensible yet recognisable is what really works to turn the audience against him from the start. Rob Riggle, who voiced Rolf, is working well in his most consistent type of role: jock-type lughead; Riggle really has a tone that bullies other characters well while also making him the biggest presence in a scene. Aven Lotz, who played Emma, brings a bit of traditional dog film warmth to the feature; those scenes in which she portrays forming a loving connection with her young pet are very charming. 

 

However, the best performance came from Josh Gad, who voiced Gus. This is a role that is only in a couple of scenes but it comes to the punchline of the best from this film very swiftly. One of Josh Gad's roles of note is his canine voice-over in A Dog's Purpose, in which he gave light narration to place us inside the perspective to a loyal pet named Bailey. Here Gad really gets to have a bit of light fun by totally parodying that role and tap into his comedic skill. Gus really gets all the passion and wonder of Gad's prior noteworthy role but with this underlying missing piece that leaves the audience wondering what the deal is with this dog. Watching as Gad gets to undercut his cuddly and cute dog persona by divulging the dark truth behind his owner is one of the best satirical takes on the dog film in this entire feature. It is a skit-like moment that entirely stole the show for me.

 

I've spent the past decade or more being excited and promptly let down by Will Ferrell led comedies, from Anchorman 2 right through to Eurovision there has barely been a comedy that has reflected the greats he used to put out. I feel the reason for that is because these comedy films have such a simplistic structure with all of the same types of jokes at this point. Strays is really no different. This film essentially tells you where it's going to go the moment Reggie becomes a stray dog, there are one or two emotional beats along the way but really there's nothing here that will surprise you. All of the jokes seem to really be in this to shock or gross out the audience, there's a ridiculous amount of jokes around dogs shitting, having sex or doing drugs which really is not a massive leap from any other general release American comedy. The subplots feel very pre-determined; the two side character dogs are eventually going to be in a relationship and the dog that hates humans will be adopted. Ultimately, Strays is happy with the low bar of expectations because it sets out to give you a low effort script almost the whole way through.

 

The cinematography has some shining moments early on but long form I thought the visuals of the feature were quite lackluster. There are restrictions to working alongside animals and the obvious setback is you have to limit how creative you can get with the camera; a lot of very simple wides or mids were utilised to capture the canine heroes. There was also some uncanny valley level quality to how they animated the dogs eyes and mouths moving, that really put me out of what I was watching a number of times. The score for the film had none of the high energy that the soundtrack gave, it barely registered and resulted in a very forgettable background cartoonish sound.  

Brett Gelman, who played Willy, is really wasted in this pratfall type character; Gelman doesn't get any room to stretch his comedic muscles and seems to be more the butt of the joke than anything else. Mikayla Rousseau, who played Riley, was probably not experienced enough to bring a character performance to the screen here; Rousseau's portrayal of a young girl feeling lost and fearful and sad really aren't convincingly depicted which means a big third act turn doesn't quite land. Dennis Quaid, who played himself, is a nice reminder that a celebrity cameo isn't always automatically funny; Quaid's delivery entirely lacks energy and he seems to be just confused as to what he's doing in the scene.

A phenomenally funny cast can't salvage what is yet another lewd low effort American comedy. I would give Strays a 4/10.