I humbly suggest skipping right to the 1 hour 15 minute mark, which includes the championship game followed by the courtroom custody battle for Buddy the dog - about 20 minutes in all. The whole movie but especially this final section is so cheesy, so maudlin, so over-the-top, so cliched that it turns into something good. There are so many moments from this final 20 minutes that crack me up every time - Coach Arthur Chaney showing up in the courtroom at just the right moment to suggest how custody should be awarded for Buddy, Buddy walking on the court with sneakers on and the ref saying "ain't no rules say the dog can't play", Coach Chaney screaming "yes!" on the sideline as the team starts to come back, Buddy stealing the ball from the nemesis player on the other team, Josh's final shot which takes about 20 seconds in slow motion and involves no fewer than 3 distinct head movements. My ironic delight in this bad movie has translated into genuine affection for it.

I loved this movie when I was a kid, and even back then I had little idea why. I mean, it wasn't like I thought it was particularly funny or touching or anything like that. I guess I just really liked the basic premise, because you have to admit the central idea is pretty weird and nutty. How stoned do you have to get before you come up with a dog that plays basketball? How would that even remotely work? I'm really putting too much thought in this movie I guess, but it's just so bizarre that I've always found it very entertaining. I've learned the sequels actually stretch the premise even further and involve dogs that can play soccer, baseball and volleyball, but this one will always be the one and only original "dog does weird athletic stuff it can't possibly do"-flick.

I like this movie, I really do. I saw this movie with my uncle for my birthday when I was 10, and I was so excited about this. And now, six years later, I still am. Josh is an 11 year old boy who moves with his sister and his mum after his father died. He's lonely, and he doesn't make friends at his new school. Until he finds a dog, also lonely. The dog belongs to some sort of clown who mistreats him and isn't really nice to him, but the dog got lost and escaped from him. And then they, the boy and the dog, become friends. Josh is the 'waterboy' of the school's basketball-team, but that changes when he discovers that the dog, with the name Buddy, can play basketball. There's nothing wrong with this film. It's a warm movie about a special friendship between two 'loners'. The story is not always really logical; it's never explained how the dog did find Josh back, but that isn't important. It's a kids movie, and children don't think about the logicalness of the movie. The actors are all wonderful in this film. Wendy Makkena, the shy Maria Roberta in the Sister Act-films, the young Kevin Zegers, a sympathetic Bill Cobs in a cliché role, and most of all Michael Jeter. It's really a shame that he died, it was such a wonderful actor. And of course Buddy, with his wonderful trainer Kevin DiMaccio, also one of the writers and producers. In this time of tragic, bloody and heavy cinema, people should enjoy this kind of films. Warm, light-hearted, and most of all: funny.

Since most kids' movies are horrible, parents dread having to sit through them alongside their children. But this is harmless, feel-good fun that even a parent can stomach. It's a tad unbelievable, and some stunts are all too convenient, but so what? We can all suspend a certain amount of disbelief and enjoy a movie, right?