Common Sense Note
Parents should know the film includes some perilous situations for humans (a fall into a crevice and icy water, frostbite and broken limbs) and huskies (they face freezing cold, blizzards, starvation, and predators, with the number of perilous "days on their own" marked by subtitles). The oldest dog must be left behind (sad scene), some dogs are injured and/or die, leaving sad-looking survivors (mournful eyes, nuzzling the dead bodies). One jump scene features a ferocious (animatronic) leopard seal, who leaps out with teeth bared to defend a whale carcass it's been eating. Some gentle romance and a kiss. Some mild language (s-word).
Families can talk about the loyalty between Jerry and his dogs: While other people think he goes too far, he sees the huskies as family members. How does the movie make the dogs seem like people, with the help of soundtrack music and close-ups to show "expressive" faces?
Common Sense Review
Reviewed By: Cynthia Fuchs
The dogs in EIGHT BELOW are excellent -- courageous, expressive, smart, and adorable. Their human costars? Well, they're okay too.
Consisting of six huskies and a couple of Malamutes, the team first appears at play: Their human leader, Jerry (Paul Walker), is hitting balls with a baseball bat, so they can charge across the snowy Antarctic tundra, bundles of boundless energy. Jerry's a good kid, devoted to his dogs and content in his employment as a guide for a research base. When scientist Davis McLaren (Bruce Greenwood) arrives in search of a meteorite from Mercury, however, trouble looms. It's close to winter, the weather is about to turn, and still, Jerry's told to take Davis out despite the odds.
Early scenes of their trek are gorgeous, the dogs running along through a grand landscape, tiny but still vibrant as they seem in tune with their environment. Then the weather turns, Davis falls into freezing water, and the team has to rush him back to base, with both men close to frostbite. Still, the dogs press on courageously, determined to reach their goal, working as a team and loyal to Jerry.
When a winter storm demands that the humans take off and leave the dogs behind, Jerry is half delirious from his ordeal, unaware that they won't be able to come right back to retrieve his "family." And so the dogs' adventure begins, as the movie counts down the number of days they're "on their own." First, they must break loose from their tether, then find food and shelter during the storm (they also face down a fierce leopard seal, whose attack on them is briefly alarming) This goes on for some 175 days, while Jerry, stuck back in the States, looks for funding and means to get back to Antarctica to save them.
Inspired by a true story that took place in 1958 and inspired a previous movie, the Japanese-made Nankyoku Monogatari (1983), the movie basically follows two plotlines: Jerry's and the dogs'. Jerry worries, beseeches, feels frustration and despair. He also has a crush on a beautiful pilot, Katie (Moon Bloodgood), and a best pal, Cooper (Jason Biggs), who provides comic relief.
But however regular Jerry's story may be, whenever the movie turns back to the dogs, it pulses with a terrific vigor. From the gallant elder dog Jack to the new kid Max (with striking blue eyes) to the gallant only female Maya, the dogs are completely winning, their efforts to look out for each other inspiring and their wonderful faces enchanting.
Families who enjoy this movie should also see March of the Penguins, Kayla (1999), and The Incredible Journey (1963). You might even want to revisit Benji (1974).
Rate It!
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Sexual ContentBrief and gentle flirting and eventual kiss. |
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ViolenceDogs attacked by leopard seal, dogs must bring down birds to eat; dogs suffer wounded legs/paws and die from cold and starvation; Davis falls through ice and must be pulled out, half-frozen; Jerry's frostbitten (blackened) fingers visible. |
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LanguageMild language (s-word) during harrowing circumstances. |
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Social BehaviorIndependent-minded Jerry won't give up on his dogs, and learns to trust his human friends as well. |
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Drug/Alcohol/TobaccoCharacters meet in a bar. |
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