It's a dog's life

Marley & Me confronts the messiness of life, writes Betsy Sharkey.

Life isn't perfect. The marriage, the kids, the jobs and the pets that come along to fill it up can get messy and difficult. But it is in the muck that we often discover the love and the laughter.

And so it is with Marley & Me — an imperfect, messy and sometimes trying film that has moments of genuine sweetness and humour.

Adapted from John Grogan's sentimental bestseller, Marley & Me is essentially the story of a couple of newlyweds and their crazy dog — with the husband played by Owen Wilson, and his wife, Jenny, by Jennifer Aniston.

World's worst dog

There is a reason the title starts with Marley, who is billed as the world's worst dog. The studio wants to remind us it's his movie. They've got a point, even Wilson and Aniston at their cutest don't have much of a chance opposite an adorable out-of-control yellow Labrador played by a succession of 22 exceptionally insistent scene-stealers that take him from puppyhood to the gray-whiskered bittersweetness of old age.

All of which would be fine if Marley & Me was a canine comedy with a little romance on the side. It isn't. There is a dark centre to the movie with difficult adult questions on the table — marriage, parenting, life and loss, served up in big emotional packages.

There is always a risk when turning a book into a movie that the filmmakers — in this case director David Frankel and writers Scott Frank and Don Roos — will find themselves with too much story. And when you have too much story and two major stars, well three, something's gotta give, or at least it should.

In Marley & Me, too often it doesn't. There are career issues, house issues, when to start a family issues, kid issues, should Jen be a stay-at-home mom issues, the old neighbourhood's decaying issues, the new neighbourhood is pretentious issues, and always, always, always the Marley issues. Whew, it's exhausting, we need a flow chart.

Pulling on heartstrings

Like the book, the film is intent on plucking those heartstrings at every turn starting with the opening pastoral scene of a boy and his dog ambling along — a bucolic moment summarily destroyed by Marley on a dead run with John Grogan (the character is the writer) trailing in his wake. Which is pretty much the way it goes for the rest of the movie. Dog with a heart of gold wreaks havoc; the increasingly not-so-happy couple tries to repair the collateral damage.

Wilson is a Lab of an actor with that shock of yellow-gold hair and the gentle good nature that flows through his work. But instead of the forever frat boy of Wedding Crashers or the surfer dropout of You, Me and Dupree, he's that guy's solid friend, the one who married his longtime sweetheart, got a job as a columnist, had a family and feels guilty about any regrets. You've always been able to sense the underlying vulnerability in his characters, but he's a bit more wounded here, and it becomes him.

Aniston is comfortable in Jen's skin, although she's always better in smaller, intimate ensembles than oversized films like Marley & Me.

Any passion in the marriage is supplied by Marley. And it is with Marley where Wilson is at his best, whether he's coming to terms with the way his life has turned out or riding a river of emotion when Marley gets sick. (This is where you should grab the tissues with both hands — one for you and the other to cover the eyes of any young children you might have with you.)

When the story lags — and it does more than a few times — there is Alan Arkin as John's crusty editor Arnie Klein to help things along. His deadpan is dead-on. But Kathleen Turner is ill-used as a cartoonish drill sergeant of a dog trainer — she barks more than they do, get it?

Frankel, who last gave us the wickedly funny The Devil Wears Prada, trusts his audience less this time around. He's clearly anxious that we won't "heel the love," as the ads plastered on billboards everywhere suggest we should. He shouldn't have worried.