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"Director: Raja Gosnell Screenwriters: Analisa LaBianco, Jeffrey Bushell Starring: Drew Barrymore, Piper Perabo, Andy Garcia, George Lopez, Jamie Lee Curtis, Manolo Cardona, Cheech Marin Running Time: 91 mins Certificate: PG Wafer-thin laughs, horrendous acting, a predictable and overly-long plot and a bizarre mixed message about remembering your heritage. These are just a couple of the things wrong with Beverly Hills Chihuahua. However, quite bizarrely, despite all of these glaring faults, this canine adventure is an easily-watchable piece of cinematic fluff whose occasional moments of surrealism bring genuine laughs. Chloe (Barrymore) is the most pampered pooch in Beverly Hills, with Louis Vuitton outfits, spa sessions and doggy playdates part of her regular routine. The white-haired spoilt Chihuahua&amp;#039;s life is turned upside down when her wealthy owner Vivian (Lee Curtis) leaves her in the hands of her party-girl niece Rachel (Perabo), who takes her on a road trip to Mexico. Frustrated at being locked in a hotel room, Chloe heads out to the Mexican beach, where she is snatched by a local gang of dog-fighting organisers. Forced to team up with grumpy German Shepherd Delgado (Garcia), Chloe attempts to make her way back to LA, while avoiding repeated attacks from the dog-fighters&amp;#039; pet Doberman Diablo and the tricky shenanigans of a street rat (Marin). Meanwhile Rachel, with the help of hunky Mexican gardener Sam (Cardona) and his dog Papi (Lopez), is on a race against time to find the lost mutt. Chihuahua is clearly intended to have a positive message about discovering and celebrating your heritage, but this fast-paced and throwaway movie really isn&amp;#039;t the place to be discussing such heavy and complex topics as America&amp;#039;s attitude to Mexican immigration. Meanwhile, director Raja Gosnell, the man behind the live-action Scooby Doo franchise, has still seemingly not mastered the art of blending computer animation with action, with the dodgily-dubbed dogs and budget so-called action scenes having a distinctly amateurish feel. Barrymore and Curtis, clearly struggling with the credit crunch more than most, put in shifts that they&amp;#039;d no doubt rather forget, while Lopez, Garcia and Marin struggle along with a string of stinking punchlines and horrifyingly bad gags that will fall flat on even very young children. Perabo who, lest we forget, has previously graced us with the Cheaper By The Dozen franchise and Slap Her...She&amp;#039;s French, looks great in a bikini, but spends the rest of the film over-acting, gawping and having one of the most unconvincing romances ever to grace the big screen with the equally plastic Cardona. Amazingly, through a mixture of surrealism and hilariously over-the-top schmaltz, these horrendous cinematic crimes don&amp;#039;t totally ruin this film. While Chihuahua is never intentionally funny - by a long stretch of the imagination - it&amp;#039;s easily watchable. A scene where a long-lost herd of Chihuahua&amp;#039;s rescue Chloe and show her a long lost Aztec kingdom filled with the pooches is almost Python-esque in its silliness, while the deadpan seriousness of the events only adds to the hilarity. Similarly a romance scene, which features Enrique Iglesias&amp;#039;s &amp;#039;Hero&amp;#039; played over the top, is both crass and wet, but undeniably funny. Chihuahua is essentially Homeward Bound for the Paris Hilton generation. Badly written and badly executed, it&amp;#039;s overall quality suggests that it should have a been a straight-to-DVD feature. Those unfortunate enough to witness the film, however, will be grateful that this film&amp;#039;s sheer awfulness generates a couple of smirks and titters to get you through to the end.  &amp;gt; What do you think of the movie? Share your views "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/review/a142514/beverly-hills-chihuahua/>