Marley & Me

Rating:	★★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Comedy

Plot:
Soon after their wedding, John and Jenny escape the brutal Michigan winters and relocate to a cottage in southern Florida, where they are hired as reporters for competing newspapers. At The Palm Beach Post, Jenny immediately receives prominent front-page assignments, while at the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, John finds himself writing obituaries and two-paragraph articles about mundane news like a fire at the local garbage dump.

When John senses Jenny is contemplating motherhood, his friend and co-worker Sebastian Tunney suggests the couple adopt a dog to see if they're ready to raise a family. From a litter of newborn yellow labrador retrievers they select Marley (named after reggae singer Bob Marley), who immediately proves to be incorrigible.

They Say:
Todd McCarthy of Variety said the film is "as broad and obvious as it could be, but delivers on its own terms thanks to sparky chemistry between its sunny blond stars, Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston, and the unabashed emotion-milking of the final reel. Fox has a winner here, likely to be irresistible to almost everyone but cats ... Animated and emotionally accessible, Aniston comes off better here than in most of her feature films, and Wilson spars well with her, even if, in the film's weaker moments, he shows he's on less certain ground with earnest material than he is with straight-faced impertinence."

Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter observed that "seldom does a studio release feature so little drama - and not much comedy either, other than when the dog clowns around . . . [W]hatever Marley wants to be about - the challenges of marriage or the balancing act between career and family - gets subsumed by pet tricks. Dog lovers won't care, and that basically is the audience for the film. From Fox's standpoint, it may be enough . . . Marley & Me is a warm and fuzzy family movie, but you do wish that at least once someone would upstage the dog."

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times called the film "a cheerful family movie" and added, "Wilson and Aniston demonstrate why they are gifted comic actors. They have a relationship that's not too sitcomish, not too sentimental, mostly smart and realistic."

Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly graded the film A-, calling it "the single most endearing and authentic movie about the human–canine connection in decades. As directed by David Frankel, though, it's also something more: a disarmingly enjoyable, wholehearted comic vision of the happy messiness of family life."

I Say:
I do love the movie, to begin with. I found the movie divided into three parts: the first being cute, the second being too hilarious, and the third one being tear-jerking. It's funny that there exists SUCH dog. Watch the movie for yourself.

I wanted to buy the book by John Grogan and read it first hand. I wanted to know how the narration really went and if there are more info about Marley.

I know it's hard to cast Marley for the entire show (they casted 22 yellow labradors) since, basically, the dog's growing: and fast. There might be inconsistencies about the dog's fur color but that's excusable. After all, the story is more important.

I must admit, I was spoiled before I watch this movie. There are some emotions I wanted to feel during watching the movie but I thought it won't happen since I spoiled myself with its synopsis. But I still felt it. A friend told me that it's because [we] can relate with the story.

I want to watch the movie again. This time: in the movie house.