TURNER AND HOOCH. Directed by Roger Spottiswoode, written by Dennis Shryack, Michael Blodgett, Daniel Petrie Jr., Jim Cash and Jack Eppa Jr.: produced by Raymond Wagner for Touchstone. Starring Tom Hanks. Rated PG.
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Turner and Hooch is a rare breed. It's an animal picture for adults as well as kids, since its four- and two-legged characters are equally well-developed. Tom Hanks has seldom made a bad movie, and Turner and Hooch won't blemish his record.
The "Turner" of the title is detective Scott (Hanks), who is bored with the lost-bicycle type of police work he sees in his placid, scenic, northern California town. In addition to being ambitious, he's also obsessively neat and orderly in his personal habits. And it's this part of his personality that runs right up against his very different co-star.
This is Hooch (Beasley and Igor, his stunt double), of course. He's the ugliest, scruffiest and supposedly meanest junkyard dog this side of anywhere. He's also got an extremely expressive face and, apparently, a good sense of comic/action timing (also, certainly, an expert trainer).
When circumstances put these two into each other's lives, the results are both hilarious and touching. The combination of wild humor and tender human feeling is one we've come to associate with Hanks, even before Big. And he gives it a different kind of expression here.
A side-plot involving Mare Winningham as Hooch's vet and Scott's love interest results in a few sexual references that might warrant some parental discretion.
A preview might be in order, too, because of some violence that might disturb younger or more sensitive children. But, generally speaking, Turner and Hooch is terrific family entertainment.
August 16, 1989