Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore [Blu-Ray]

Second only to the beloved animal athlete genre spearheaded by that irrepressible Air Bud and perfected by chimps playing hockey, the live-action talking animal film is indeed an entity unto itself, like marzipan or Velveeta. Undoubtedly, viewers that delight in the image of a beagle wearing glasses or a cat holding a walkie-talkie will get their fill of jokes about killer kitty litter and dogs sniffing each other's butts in this sequel to Jeff Goldblum's career topping 2001 spectacle, Cats & Dogs. But don't be deterred if you haven't seen the original, because The Revenge of Kitty Galore doesn't require a detailed knowledge of characters or plot intricacies from its predecessor. In fact, aside from a brief Hannibal Lecter spoof featuring Mr. Tinkles (Sean Hayes), nothing here requires knowledge of any sort. As an added bonus, the human star of this one is a leather jacket-wearing Chris O'Donnell, whose slow motion introduction to kid movie favourite "Bad to the Bone" (because if anyone is bad to the bone, it's Chris O'Donnell) sets the tone for this zany play on James Bond. The spin here is that the ever-battling cats and dogs, with their secret spy lairs and underground networks, must reluctantly work together to battle a common enemy, in the form of a bald pussycat named Kitty Galore (Bette Midler). Expert agent Butch (Nick Nolte) recruits German shepherd Diggs (James Marsden) to help investigate her whereabouts, with a kung-fu fighting cat named Catherine (Christina Applegate) in tow. Along the way, they are aided by jive-talking pigeon Seamus (Katt Williams), who helps them navigate through the air and over water to Kitty Galore's secret lair. With references to older Bond films (Roger Moore voices a cat spy named Tab Lazenby) and set pieces involving a house full of stoned cats talking to furniture, most of the gags are aimed squarely at parents, which is an odd juxtaposition to dialogue like, "Just because she's a Doberman doesn't mean you can pinch her." Zing! And while the entire ordeal is a steaming pile, I can say that The Revenge of Kitty Galore is the best film in 2010 that features an elderly woman being assaulted by animal faeces and cat litter. The Blu-Ray includes both a bonus DVD and digital copy of the film, covering all the bases, along with a faux-gag reel and behind-the-scenes where the animals are voiced by different actors while discussing poop at length. There's also a computer animated Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner cartoon, which at least stays true to the extreme violence of the original, sans anvil.