Snow Buddies

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Snow Buddies
Directed by Robert Vince
Produced by Robert Vince
Anna McRoberts
Written by Robert Vince
Anna McRoberts
Starring Molly Shannon
Tom Everett Scott
Kris Kristofferson
Josh Flitter
Jimmy Bennett
Skyler Gisondo
Henry Hodges
Liliana Mumy
Music by Brahm Wenger
Distributed by Walt Disney Pictures
Release date(s) February 5, 2008
Country Flag of the United States
Language English
Budget $4 million
Preceded by Air Buddies
Followed by Space Buddies[1]
Official website
IMDb profile

Snow Buddies is a 2008 direct to video in the Air Bud series and was the first to receive a G rating since Air Bud: Spikes Back. It was released on DVD on 5 February 2008.

Contents

[edit] Cast

[edit] Plot

The movie follows the story of Buddy and Molly's offspring in Washington. The puppies are playing hide-and-seek one morning when Budderball finds an ice-cream truck. Rosebud spots the hapless canine and follows him in an attempt to help. Hilarity ensues when Buddha finds them both in the truck and B-Dawg and Mud-Bud end up in the truck which is shipping to Alaska.

In Alaska, the Buddies meet Shasta, a young husky whose owner wants nothing more than to mush. The puppies take a vote to help a grateful Shasta to pursue his dreams. Unfortunately, as Shasta has no parents, this puts the puppies in a predicament as there is nobody to teach them how to become snow dogs and the local population of older puppies sneers at the thought of them learning how. Luckily, they find Talon, his father's mentor, in the mountains. Although initially reluctant, Shasta manages to persuade Talon into teaching the over-zealous puppies into becoming his new protégés by reminding him that "It's not the size of the dog that counts but the heart of team".

When Shasta introduces his owner, Adam, to her new sleigh team, the child is delighted at the prospect of her dreams coming true and the team pursue vigorous training routines often to comedic effect.

Adam begins building a new sleigh with her team of hard-working puppies. Talon proudly watches as the team's efforts come to fruition and it seems as though they are cooperating as a team. The older town huskeys, however, are not impressed and begin to plan their downfall. They reveal to the Buddies that Shasta's parents died when the ice beneath them shattered to dishearten them.

Back in Washington, Buddy and Molly find Budderball's toy American football on the back of the ice-cream truck and proceed to take the same route the puppies did to Alaska.

Talon calls the puppies to the mountain late on night to view the Northern Lights before he departs telling Shasta that knows all he needs to know and that he can become the great leader that his father was. The following morning, the puppies enter the race with Adam. After being reminded by how treacherous the race is by the sheriff, the puppies begin their trek.

Meanwhile, Buddy and Molly go looking for the puppies in Alaska where the rescue dog Bernie informs them of their participation in the race and, without further hesitation, the trio try to find the puppies. Adam's father also begins looking for his son.

The team manage to make it to the midway checkpoint without much difficulty. The sheriff finally checks his email and finds out that the puppies in his town are actually the missing puppies from Washington. The snowstorm becomes more and more dangerous as Adam's father gets snowed in and Adam's main competitor and owner of the rival snow dogs begins cheating by sabotaging the competing sleds. Adam and the team take shelter in an igloo provided by an inuit until the storm subsides. They come head to head with their opponent, Jean George and Adam gets injured.

Luckily Adam recovers. Jean George's dogs, the bullies from earlier get into trouble when the ice beneath them shatters. Jean George continues and abandons his dogs while Adam and the puppies begin a rescue operation despite Shasta's fears of his parents' deaths. The puppies pull the dogs out of the icy waters and Jean George resumes the race without any gratitude.

Jean George's dogs realize they owe nothing to their owner and everything to Shasta and the Buddies, and so, slow down causing Jean George to lose the race. Adam is victorious and the Buddies reunite with Buddy and Molly. Jean George gives out to his dogs and they respond in kind by chasing him around the Arctic. The Buddies, all seven of them return home via airplane.

[edit] Controversy

Disney imported 25-30 under-aged golden retriever puppies into Vancouver, Canada for the filming of the movie. Many of the puppies contracted the highly contagious parvovirus, against which puppies are usually vaccinated at 8 weeks of age. At least 15 puppies showed signs of the illness, including parasitic infections of giardia and coccidia, and all thirty were removed from the set. Three were euthanized. After the enforced removal of the first set of puppies, Disney hired 28 older puppies to continue filming. These puppies were also exposed to the virus, increasing the death toll. At least five puppies are reported to have died during the making of the movie.[2]

[edit] Production notes

[edit] References

  1. ^ Space Buddies (2008) (V)
  2. ^ American Humane: Newsroom: News Releases: Snow Buddies

[edit] External links

v • d • e
The Air Bud Series