I was surprised to find a new holiday moving starring canines that I hadn't yet heard of; clearly, it was brand new and had made its way silently onto shelves. Somehow, it struck me as being a cartoon movie worth seeing and not a cheesy disappointment. I was right. The DVD features are surprisingly good; a music video, game, instructional holiday crafts video for kids, and a particularly nice segment on the dog breeds represented in the movie as well as mixed breeds comprise the features. The story, although geared toward younger viewers, is unique, clever, amusing, and touching enough to make 'Nine Dog Christmas' suitable for nearly any viewer.I found the characters of the movie to be in many ways similar to previously known canine characters. In fact, the movie reminded me of a six-way cross among "Homeward Bound 2," "All Dogs go to Heaven 2," "Oliver and Company," "Lady and the Tramp," "101 Dalmatians," and "Nick and Noel." It's not that the movie is simply a conglomeration of these and hasn't got a style all its own. It's simply that MacGregor, the Scottie, strongly brings to mind Jock of "Lady and the Tramp." Snowplow, the Australian-accented Old English sheepdog, resembles both Nick from "Nick and Noel" and the Colonel from "101 Dalmatians." Further, the Chihuahua Cheech is like Tito of "Oliver and Company." It's almost as though cousins of these dogs were now starring in their own film!The other dogs of Pierre LeRond's traveling circus are great; Chester the boxing British Bulldog is perhaps the funniest. No-Name is a lovable old hound dog obsessed with going 'home,' never realizing that he hadn't had a true "home"...until Santa gave him one. Fetch is a hyper hound mix (maybe part Lab or something else), and Tank (apparently part Basset and/or Beagle) is cute and one of the main characters. Q.T. is the pretty Cocker spaniel mix girl who falls in love with Tank rather quickly; the fantasy scene between those two is quite unexpected but fun. Frenchy the Bull Terrier might be the best character because he is the most multifaceted. He's complex, interesting, and somewhat gruff, and does change sides during the film. On the whole, though, the dogs seem to be quite 'Disneyesque.' The songs, especially the Tank/Q.T. one (which reminded me of Audrey's 'Somewhere that's Green' number from 'Little Shop of Horrors' because it involves dreaming of that sort of perfect home with someone else), and the song between elves Buzz and Agnes Anne, are not half bad. Where do I find the most fault with this movie? Without a doubt: its length. I felt it could have been made much longer without losing the audience's interest. In fact, had the story been elaborated, it would have drawn an audience in even more effectively. An hour just passes for 'full length,' but I thought it could have stood to be even longer. Still, 'Nine Dog Christmas' did impress me as one of the better little holiday cartoon movies of late. Clever and entertaining, it focuses on the holiday in general (in a way anyone could appreciate), and also doesn't beat the usual kids-movie morals to death. It finds its own way to get messages across. With decent low-budget animation and great voice acting on most characters, 'Nine Dog Christmas' is all in all an awesome for children that has good enough dialog (and, let's face it, enough cute dogs and cool music and such) for everybody.It's worth a solid 9 out of 10 stars! ;) If you get a chance to watch this little Christmas gem, by all means--go for it! It's been one of my annual holiday favorites since I fortunately spotted it at Target in 2004. Now, if I only knew what happened to the little plush Snowplow that came with it...! :(

Sure, it's for kids, but I'm no kid...well maybe an over=grown one or a kid at heart. Anyway, I liked this because the dogs were well characterized as individuals albeit stereotyped ones. The animation is standard and while nothing outstanding, it's sure adequate.James Earl Jones of course added his own sympathetic tones to the narration. It has a reasonably complicated enough plot for those at all age levels, so even if you're adult and feel silly watching something like this, grab a kid and watch it with him or her..he or she will love it and especially if you're a dog lover, you'll like it too, whether you want to admit it or not. Ho, ho, ho!

I only saw this once and I'll say it again, IT'S JUST FOR THE KIDS! I know this is for Christmas and everybody loves to settle down to a nice family treat with lovable characters and heartwarming endings but if I may say so if you are over the age of 11, this isn't really your thing! The animation is not poor but nowhere near special. The plot is kind of predictable and the characters are cute, but not memorably cute! This is more of what I say an endurance test than a heartwarming family Yuletide classic! If you are looking for Xmas Classics I strongly recommend Elf (2003) with Will Ferrell, Home Alone (1990) with Macaulay Culkin or The Polar Express (2004) with Tom Hanks because I would think you will like them better! 4/10