More Of A Flophouse For Dogs

For some reason, my dad had auto-tuned his TV to Hotel for Dogs. Based on the opening credits, I was horrified and wanting to change the channel back to what he was watching before, that movie with Kevin Costner about the Cuban Missile Crisis. That's saying something, given my antipathy for Costner.

The movie gets somewhat better after that. Pair of siblings in foster care, trying to keep their dog safe from Animal Control on the sly, find an abandoned hotel with two dogs already living in it. With the help of three other teens they repurpose the entire hotel as a place for stray dogs. Eventually they're found out, the siblings are sent to separate foster situations, the dogs are all locked up, and the kids must stage an attempted rescue to get the dogs across the county line.

I honestly can't remember any of the teens' names, though I remember Don Cheadle as the Child Services Guy Who Cares A Lot was "Bernie". I assume my dad was watching it mostly for all the different dogs, and the humor involving them outwitting various members of the establishment (can dumbasses working for Animal Control be The Establishment?)

We were both amused by the range of devices the younger of the two siblings kept cobbling together from random crap. My dad was mildly concerned the kid would become a super-villain, and if he had stayed in that foster home where his sister wasn't around, he probably would have. Just delved deeper into his odd creations as an escape and grown more bitter. I was hoping in the big conclusion at the hotel, the kids were going to lure the police and Animal Control inside, then get them tangled up in the various contraptions like some up-scaled Home Alone scenario. That would have livened things up.