SYNOPSICS
The Shaggy D.A. (1976) is a English movie. Robert Stevenson has directed this movie. Dean Jones,Suzanne Pleshette,Tim Conway,Keenan Wynn are the starring of this movie. It was released in 1976. The Shaggy D.A. (1976) is considered one of the best Comedy,Family,Fantasy movie in India and around the world.
Sequel to the 1959 movie about a boy who gets turned into a dog because of an ancient ring which some say is cursed. Today the boy, Wilby Daniels is a grown man, a lawyer and with a family. When they're robbed and Wilby tries to report it to police but only gets the run around, he decides to run for District Attorney or D.A. Because he believes that the current D.A. John Slade is not only doing his job but is on the take. When Daniels publicly denounces Slade, Slade decides to try and get something on him. And he might have found it when the ring that turned him into a dog when he was a boy is stolen from the museum and when the words inside are read, he turns into a dog.
More
The Shaggy D.A. (1976) Reviews
funny family film
One of the better Disney comedies from the 70's.This sequel to The Shaggy Dog is a bit funnier than the first film. With Dean Jones, Suzanne Pleshette, Tim Conway and Keenan Wynn it has a top notch cast. Anyone who enjoys good clean family entertainment should get plenty of chuckles from this slapstick romp. Rate it a 7.5 of 10
Great for Fans of Slapstick!
I saw this back in 1976 and thought it was the funniest movie ever. Of course, I was only 7 at the time. I saw it again recently and of course noticed several things I didn't see the first time. The story is about a young lawyer/family man (Dean Jones) who runs for DA against the corrupt DA currently in office (Keenan Wynn) but the latter gets ahold of a ring which has an inscription that when read, can turn Jones into a sheepdog. The same gag (of Jones becoming a sheepdog at the worst possible time) is repeated a bit too much and most of the gags are obvious and dependant upon banana peel-like slapstick/humor. Dean Jones is a fine actor but he kept playing the same character over and over in the Disney comedies of the 70s. (He never seemed to know what was going on and was constantly the butt of the joke). Not surprisingly, the Disney slapstick films soon wore out their welcome. The Shaggy DA though is one of Disney's better offerings. It features a pretty good cast. Tim Conway as an ice cream man is especially in good form and Vic Tayback adds some life as a mobster who is in cahoots with Wynn. The humor is dated and certainly not aimed at intelligent kids but for the most part, it does deliver with the laughs.
A delightfully wacky romp
Amiable lawyer Wilby Daniels (winningly played by Dean Jones) is running for district attorney. Wilby once again gets stricken by the Borgia ring curse which causes him to transform into a large shaggy sheepdog at inopportune moments. His shady and crooked no-count rival John Slade (a marvelously hearty'n'huffy portrayal by Keenan Wynn) tries to get his hands on said ring so he can fix the election. Director Robert Stevenson, working from a blithely silly script by Don Tait, relates the loopy story at a constant zippy pace, maintains a good-natured and innocuous tone throughout, and stages the expected zany slapstick with considerable panache (a wild pie fight and an equally crazy car chase rate as the definite sidesplitting comic highlights). Moreover, the top-rate cast play their parts with infectiously zesty aplomb: Jones is totally engaging in the lead, Tim Conway is in peak goofy form as eager beaver ice cream man Tim (the scenes with Tim trying to convince other people his dog Elwood can talk are hilarious!), Suzanne Pleshette brings some class to her role as Wilby's supportive wife Betty, Wynn grouches it up with growly gusto as a deliciously broad heavy, plus there are neat supporting contributions from Jo Anne Worley as brassy, chipper lunch lady Katrinka Muggelberg, Dick Van Patten as Slade's obsequious partner Raymond, Vic Tayback as fearsome crime boss Eddie Roschak, Richard Bakalyan as bumbling hoodlum Freddie, and John Fiedler as jolly dog catcher Howie Cummings. Buddy Baker's bouncy score, Fred V. Phillips' sharp cinematography, the nifty make-up f/x, and the jaunty theme song all further enhance the sweetly inane charm of this immensely enjoyable hoot.
From Human To Canine And Back
I guess that when Dean Jones and Suzanne Pleshette got married it wasn't spelled out that there would be no secrets because Dean Jones kept a really big one from his teen years. For what that was and how it turned out one should see the prequel to The Shaggy DA, the famous Walt Disney classic, The Shaggy Dog. To refresh one's memory back then the Dean Jones character of Wilby Daniels was played by Tommy Kirk who because of a cursed ring said to belong to Lucretia Borgia back in the day who allegedly dabbled in the black arts, Kirk would enter the body of a large sheep dog who was owned by the new next door neighbors of his family. When the ring got returned and Kirk performed a heroic act, the curse was lifted. Or so they thought, now Wilby Daniels is played by Dean Jones who now is a lawyer, running for District Attorney against corrupt DA Keenan Wynn and married to Suzanne Pleshette with a son, Shane Sinutko. Just as the campaign gets going the ring is once again stolen from the museum and when the magic words inscribed on the ring are uttered, Jones is shifting from human to canine and back. Eventually chief villain Keenan Wynn gets the ring and he's in control of the situation when he discovers what it does to Jones. It becomes a family project to get that ring back and expose him before the electorate. Also along for the ride is Tim Conway, an ice cream truck vendor whose shaggy dog's body Jones transfers to. The Shaggy DA has a lot of laughs in it and its good entertainment, it doesn't however have the poignancy of the teen angst that Tommy Kirk brought to the original Wilby. It does have the usual cast of Hollywood veterans that the Disney studio always managed to find work for. It's one of the reasons the Magic Kingdom films from the late Sixties and Seventies are a lot of fun, it's like watching some of the classic films from the studio system days, seeing all those familiar faces. I'd still recommend the film, especially to family audiences with younger viewers, but it's not as good as the original.
Good family film, but not great
Attorney Wilby Daniels (played by Dean Jones) and his wife Betty (played by Suzanne Pleshette) return to their home and find out that it has just been robbed. After the robbers return a second time to take everything else that they had left, Wilby decides to run for District Attorney so he can clean up the town and lock up the criminals for good. Meanwhile, the same robbers who broke into his house have also stolen the famous Borgia ring from the local museum. Unfortunately for Wilby, every time someone reads the inscription, he turns into a sheepdog again. This of course, happens at the most inconvenient times, and the result is a silly, family-friendly comedy. The Shaggy D.A. is a sequel to the 1959 Disney film, the Shaggy Dog. Though it's not quite as funny as the original, there still is a lot to like about this version of the story. The acting is pretty much on par with what we've come to expect from these Disney films, and the characters are pretty interesting, even if they are one-dimensional. The transformation from human to dog doesn't seem to work as well here as it did in the 1959 film, for some reason, but it's fine. If I had a complaint about this movie, it's that it goes a bit long and the same gags are used a few times too many. Other than that, it's nice to find a film that doesn't resort to 7th grade humor that seems to be in every "family" film these days. The bottom line is this is a decent movie if you'd like to have a good time with the kids, but adults will be a bit bored from it fairly soon. It's not as good as some of the other Disney comedies from the 1960s and 1970s.