Turner & Hooch

A fussy cop works a small town beat in tune with blasé predictable rhythms, everything filed in fortune frisked throughout the flogged fastidious day (Tom Hanks as Scott Turner). 

He's put in for a transfer however to the less familiar big city, and only has a week to go before he makes the shocking move.

But as he prepares to daringly depart a close friend is suddenly murdered, his dog left with nowhere to go if Turner doesn't take him in.

The case offers an enticing break from traditional misdemeanours, albeit fraught with potent woe tragic discourse bitter reckoning.

The dog's a resounding wrecking ball who is unaccustomed to disciplined order, his instinctual rambunctuosity bold and playful yet borderline chaotic.

Turner may be uptight but he's still a gamer and willing to go with the flow, Hooch even accompanying him to work where he quickly generates voyeuristic leads.

Turner may have been ill-prepared for the sudden distressing ill-composed calamity, but his resilient know-how and clever insights make up for the lack of precedent.

Of course, it's first and foremost a dog/cop movie wherein which the canine endearingly wreaks havoc, absurd laughs and heartfelt hyperbole overwhelming the practical element.

In fact adult me noticed the time and thought, "the film's more than half way through and they haven't even started investigating!", but then I remembered that such concerns made no impact as a child as long as they were dealt with in due time.

Turner & Hooch is certainly much less radical than K-9 and also more plausible and collegial to boot, the two forging a bizarro hands-on synthesis if viewed late at night in close succession.

While K-9 upholds improbability with frenetic freeform frenzied excess, T & H celebrates moderate logic as it's applied to bucolic metamorphosis. 

You might think it's just a silly dog movie best reserved for ages 5 to 10, but Tom Hanks by no means dismissed it and delivered an incredible performance considering.

The flexible ways in which he resoundingly reacts to scenes where it's just him and a dog, demonstrate so much otherworldly multidimension that I was instantly reminded of Kyle Lowry. 

I guess you can't make films like these with cats but that shouldn't prevent people from trying, perhaps not just one cat but several and a plot to prevent the subversion of independent theatre.

They do a lot more with Hooch than Jerry Lee not that they both don't have their moments.

I don't know if they were released by rival studios.

But they both came out in 1989.

With Reginald VelJohnson (David Sutton) and Craig T. Nelson (Chief Hyde).