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#and also richard gere in hachi because of what happened later with the train station
allfandomdojo · 5 years
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Hachi, a dog's story
The movie is loosely adapted from the true story of a dog that would wait patiently every day waiting for its owner on the same spot until it died in the 1930s.  The dog in question, Hachiko, was honored in Rhode Island in 2012 by erecting a bronze statue on its honor for being ever loyal till the end.  Such story would be adapted on film and released in 2009, where it is incorporated in a semi-lackluster kind of way.  It begins with a kid in school choosing the tale of his grandfather's dog, Hachi, as the story of the hero he admires the most, something that other students laugh at but it does not deter the kid from telling it.
  It then turns on to an adorable Akita pup being stranded near the train station where Professor Parker Wilson (played by Richard Gere) finds it and brings it home, much to his wife's chagrin.  The wife in question played by Cate Wilson urges him to set up flyers everywhere in town in hopes that someone can find the dog, something their daughter objects and Parker frowns at, but has no other choice but to obey what she wishes for.  In time Parker fails to find anyone who would claim the puppy and even his wife drops her protests after seeing how well both had bonded over time, allowing the dog to stay with the family just as someone had called for an inquiry about the pet.
Time passes and Hachi (a name Parker figures out by reading a Japanese symbol on the Akita's collar) often leaves home to follow his master all the way to the train station and waits for him to return near a hot dog vendor's spot, something of a routine that is adapted for a good chunk of the film.  During this time we see more adorable scenes between Parker and Hachi, including one where both take a bath in the house's bathroom after being sprayed by a wild skunk found in a garage.  Despite Parker's efforts in training Hachi to stay still and learn dog tricks, the Akita simply refuses to be schooled and prefers to be free to show his affection to his master every day and with every opportunity he gets.  This of course does not last long enough as Parker then gets passes away after having a brain hemorrhage during one of his classes, something Hachi as a dog does not comprehend as he still visits the same spot waiting for his master's return from the train.  
As time passes, the family moves out the house and takes Hachi along, now being taken cared for by Parker's daughter who gets married and goes on making a life of her own.  However Hachi still rebels at the idea of moving on without his original master and runs off to the same spot every day and all day long.  This gets the attention of a journalist who visits town to take photos of the dog dutifully waiting for his master as word gets around the country.  In time Hachi dies of old age, still at the same spot that he ever waited while having a comforting vision of his master finally coming back to hold him on his arms as it was on his happier days.  The film then concludes with said kid, finishing off the tale to teary eyed students who all clap at the conclusion, followed by a card stating the real life Hachi being honored as a bronze statue stating the time he passed away to the audience.
While Hachi a Dog's Tale tries to deliver a touching story of a dog's never ending devotion to his master, it falls in a thrall where it feels unfulfilled.  Simply put, the entire emotional bit could have been delivered better as Hachi waited endlessly until his demise.  It is a shame that the last half of the movie simply feels like it drags on with the Akita waiting at the same spot as the world moves around him.  A shame also because the dog in question (played by various Akitas as the wiki page states) shows so much love to Gere's character in every scene he's shown with a human actor.  It is also questionable that while his grandson is the one telling the story, it simply does not fill the gap on how exactly he knew all of the events up to that point, being that the kid in question was but a baby by the time his grandfather passed away, and all the info he ever got about Hachi was through a photo album being shown by his mother.  It is stated that Hachi lived for over 10 years within the movie's time always waiting at the same spot but there was never a scene when said kid was ever shown with him, even though his grandmother would know where to find him.
Another bit that leaves one perplexed is the events of the movie itself.  According to the story behind the admirable animal, this happened in the 1930s whereas the film is done in contemporary times.  It is simply confusing when at the end it is shown a photo of the bronze statue with the year being set while in a scene from the film states Gere's character dies in the later 90s.  
Hachi a Dog's Tale is not a failure by all means, and its purpose to show the love a dog has for its master is quite an admirable premise, it just falls short on showing it quite the same way it was intended.  Nevertheless, pet owners and animal lovers will no doubt be teary eyed at the events shown in the film, ignoring all these imperfections.  For anyone else, it is quite a big pill to swallow in absorbing the same level of emotion overall.
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