'Dogs' a happy tail of civil disobedience school

Here's a daring, wacky kids fantasy that knows exactly what it's about and knows exactly which buttons to push to make its audiences swoon with puppy love.

I am convinced I will wind up in the film critic doghouse for this, but I loved this dopey dog movie.

The overacting barely qualifies for TV sitcom status. The goofy script is sophomoricly simple. The ending shoots way, way off the silly charts.

So what?

This surprisingly touching story concerns two orphan siblings who adopt and protect orphan dogs. When the adult world rejects and misunderstands them, the kids form their own family bonds. When social injustice wags its ugly tail, the kids band together and do what kids can't do in real life: challenge authority to serve an interest greater than their own.

"Hotel for Dogs" (the greatest self-descriptive title since "Snakes on a Plane") opens with 16-year-old Andi (Emma Roberts) and 11-year-old Bruce (Jake T. Austin) getting in trouble for fleecing pawnshop owners with fake items.

Their social worker Bernie (Don Cheadle, who plays his role so straight, he could be starring in "Hotel Rwanda 2"), reluctantly sends them back to their fifth set of foster parents, Lois and Carl (Lisa Kudrow and Kevin Dillon), two hideously self-centered, self-deluded wannabe rock musicians. Bernie hasn't been able to find the right home for the siblings.

One night, the cops mistake Andi and Bruce for thieves, and the kids elude the officers by ducking into a scary, abandoned hotel whose huge neon marquee flickers to life, announcing its presence and inviting the kids inside.

Is the place haunted?

No, but it is inhabited - by a zillion dogs that have taken refuge from the evil city dog catchers, storm trooper-like characters who send their canine guests to the big doghouse in the sky every 72 hours.

With help from new friends Dave (Johnny Simmons), Heather (Kyla Pratt) and Mark (Troy Gentile), Andi and Bruce fix up the dilapidated hotel and turn it into a canine utopia powered by the most ingenious Rube Goldbergian machines since Pee-wee Herman fixed breakfast.

An electric choo-choo delivers the formal evening meals on conveyor belts. Doors equipped with automatic boot knockers keep the dogs alert and barking. The pooches can even experience a country drive thanks to a simulation ride with real car doors and rear-projected video clips.

"Hotel for Dogs" is directed by Thor Freudenthal, who works up a real sweat with his camera. He loves extremely tight shots, traveling shots, point-of-view shots and whip-pan shots, all of which reject the look of a conventional made-for-TV movie.

Freudenthal never shoves our noses in the obvious and has great fun lampooning the stupid clichés that other filmmakers continue to utilize in earnest. (The shot of a poodle shaking water from her head in sexy slow-motion is a howl.)

Besides, what's not to love about a movie where the American press actually ensures social justice (from a child's point of view), and kids have the courage to stand up for doggy rights as proud graduates of the all-American civil disobedience school?

"Hotel for Dogs"

Rating: Three stars

Starring: Emma Roberts, Jake T. Austin, Lisa Kudrow, Kevin Dillon, Don Cheadle

Directed by: Thor Freudenthal

Other: A Paramount Pictures release. Rated PG. 100 minutes