Dogs 1976 (remastered widescreen edition)

The Pack, Cujo, Devil Dog, Zoltan, dogs remain to be a horror film staple. Dogs can be truly terrifying-especially stray dogs that travel in packs. The 1970s nature run amok film genre really began due to Willard (1971). While The Birds was seen as the trigger-that film was popular but wasn't really the kick starter. Willard received a sequel-Ben in 1972. Following in Willard's and Ben's footsteps were Frogs (1972), and Phase IV (1974). Then in 1975 the infamous Jaws hit theaters and made the genre popular again. With its success came Grizzly (1976), BUG (1975), Squirm (1976), and of course DOGS (1976). While Dogs as a small cult following-not too many people care for it-why that is, I honestly don't know. I found Dogs to be a decent example of the genre and it's far better than Tentacles (1977) or Empire of the Ants (1977). Dogs has some similarities with Bug-mainly that it revolves around a "professor" of sorts, a college, but Dogs also has some originality to itself. Plot: Domestic canines begin to turn on people. It's up to Harlan Thompson and Michael Fitzgerald to stop the attacks. My Thoughts: David McCallum is fantastic and gives a great performance. Many viewers tend to find his character to be arrogant or "full of himself" but I disagree-I found his character rater likeable. George Wyner is also great in his role. Everybody else gives pretty solid performances as well. The dog attacks are staged pretty well and the cinematography is beautiful. The musical score is pretty good as well. The film includes quite a bit of good gore. The writing was solid and the direction as well. I really do love this film. My only gripe is that the reason for the dog attacks is never given full explanation. However its only minor and can easily be over looked. The pacing is perfect and I never found myself bored. The film musters up quite a bit of atmosphere and even some suspense. There are even underlying messages within the film-that most nature-horror flicks don't include. All in all the movie is well made and is an underrated cult classic. Fun Facts: A sequel was going to be made entitled Cats. Rating: The Film-5/5 stars DVD-5/5 stars Scorpion Releasing once again gives DOGS' fans something to bark about. Te disc includes....Main FeatureCast/Crew InterviewsOriginal TrailerFun Facts/TriviaLiner NotesAlso included is an essay written by Lee GambinFarewell: If you love killer animal movies or are a fan of older/70s horror films you'll probably enjoy DOGS as much as I did. Wile it's no masterpiece-it's a decent little movie made with love and care. By all means purchase Scorpion's dvd because it's fantastic disregard the older dvd release or VHS releases."DOGS, they're coming. They'll be here soon. Will you be ready for DOGS!"

The 70's churned out plenty of "animals gone amok" films thanks to the success of JAWS (1975). Some were blatant rip-offs (GRIZZLY - 1976; CLAWS - 1977) and some were quite good (THE PACK - 1977; PIRANHA - 1977), but DOGS falls somewhere in the middle. Thanks to a top-secret government laboratory that's performing "high energy particle experiments", a small college town is experiencing rolling electrical blackouts and a series of unexplained mutilation deaths in both livestock and, eventually, people. Biologist Harlan Thompson (David McCallum; TV's NCIS) and hotshot new college professor Michael Fitzgerald (George Wyner; SPACEBALLS - 1987) try to figure out what is causing all these deaths, but it is obvious to the viewer early on that normally harmless domesticated dogs are responsible, as they seem to pack together at night with the singular purpose of ripping apart anything that crosses their path. What Harlan and Michael find so strange is that while the attacks are savage, none of the corpses seem to have been eaten, like the animals are killing not from hunger, but for the sake of killing. It's not long before our two heroes trace the cause of the attacks to the government facility and their extremely huge particle accelerator experiments, but they have a hard time convincing the powers-that-be of their concerns. That all changes when the canines at a local dog show break their leashes and attack their masters, but instead of listening to Harlan's advice of going home and locking their doors, some of the macho men form a hunting party, which leads to a mass dog attack where all those involved are savagely mauled to death. The dogs take over the town, attacking and slaughtering everyone they come in contact with. The dogs then turn their attention to the college campus, trapping all the students and faculty at the campus library, which leads to the deaths of nearly every person trapped there. Harlan and his girlfriend, Caroline (Sandra McCabe), flee the town and see nothing but death in their wake (including Michael's chewed-up body). The closing shot shows that's it's not just Fido that is now infected (Meow!). DOGS (also known as SLAUGHTER) plays like a TV movie with lots of blood and foul language. Director Burt Brinckerhoff is better known for directing numerous TV movies (BRAVE NEW WORLD - 1980) and episodes of TV series throughout the 70's, 80's & 90's, so it should come as no surprise that this has the look and feel of a 70's Movie of the Week (As far as I can discern, Brinckerhoff has only one other non-TV credit in his extensive career, 1978's ACAPULCO GOLD). Like the similarly themed THE PACK, domesticated dogs turn nasty, and in order to pull it off on-screen, you have to make normally harmless-looking dogs seem deadly. While it may be easy to make Dobermans, German Shepherds and other larger canines look threatening, the trick is to make poodles, Jack terriers and other smaller dogs look the same way. That's where DOGS falls short. It's hard to take some of the attack scenes here seriously, especially when the little nippers are wagging their tails and look as happy as when they lick peanut butter off their trainer's private parts. Brinckerhoff doesn't hold back on the blood and shows the effects of the dog attacks in great detail (the attack on the campus library is very bloody), not to mention the scene of Michael accidentally shooting and killing a man when he is trying to shoot a dog, but most of the film is flat and bland. David McCallum sleepwalks through his role and Sandra McCabe is extremely bad in her debut film performance (She is one of the worst screamers in film history and had a very short acting career). I did like how excellent, unsung character actor George Wyner, who usually has small roles on TV and in films, is given the chance to shine here in one of his biggest film roles. He's the best thing about this film. Future DALLAS [1978 - 1991] star Linda Gray has a small role as tease Miss Engle, who is attacked by dogs while taking a shower. She also supplies the film's only brief shot of nudity. Other 70's animals attack films include DAY OF THE ANIMALS (1976), THE BEASTS ARE ON THE STREETS (1978), MANEATERS ARE LOOSE (1978) and NIGHTWING (1979). Also starring Eric Server, Sterling Swanson, Holly Harris, Lance Hool, Barry Greenberg, Dean Santoro, Cathy Austin and Jim Stathis. The version on VHS from Genesis Home Video (under the title SLAUGHTER) is to be avoided at all costs. It's muddy and unwatchable. The budget fullscreen DVD release from Trinity Home Entertainment is a much better, if not perfect, choice. Even better is the DVD/Blu-Ray offered by Scorpion Entertainment in it original aspect ratio. It's really the only way to watch this film now and contains extras like interviews with the cast and crew and extensive liner notes by author Lee Gambin. Rated R.

...and now talks to dead bodies, he took a class on animal behavior. At first I couldn't believe David McCallum(Ducky NCIS) starred in this low budget creature feature but when I did research it was him. Overall, this is your typical 1970s low budget creature feature. These dogs are mostly well groomed pure breeds that suddenly turn viscous. A fun movie.

I'm not going to add to the review of the film, but just to say that the current Scorpion Region 1 USA DVD release is a remastered edition with an excellent, clean and sharp picture. Older reviews have stated that the picture quality is poor, but this release is more recent and has been improved upon.