Old Dogs(film)

Charlie and Dan are best friends and co-workers. Seven years prior to the present time of the movie, Dan was once married and when he divorced he was very depressed. In order to cheer Dan up, Charlie takes him on a wild vacation where Dan meets a woman named Vicki who he thinks is his soul mate. Along with Vicki is her equally beautiful but weird best friend Jenna who is overly obsessed with her hands because she is a hand model. Dan and Vicki marry the same night they meet but their love affair is short lived. Seven years later, Vicki arrives back in town and announces to Dan that they have twins: Zach and Emily together.

Dan offers to take care of the children the same day he meets them after Vicki has to go to jail for two weeks due to an activist crime. Originally, the kids were going to stay with Jenna but Dan severely injures her by mistake so she ends up in the hospital, nearly immobile and unable to watch the kids. Because Dan's condo does not allow children, he has to board with Charlie. Whilst this is happening, Charlie and Dan are about to score their greatest gig in the history of their careers with a Japanese corporation. At first, Charlie doesn't want Dan hanging around the children, but later warms up to the idea. Dan does not know how to interract with his kids, and at night he resignedly groans to Charlie, "I just shook my daughter's hand goodnight". At camp, the four turn a three day trip into a nine hour one after the kids unwittingly convinced the instructors that Dan and Charlie are weird partners. Charlie is harassed by the instructor's psychotic brother , and by the end of the day, Dan ends up destroying a statue of the founder of the camp.

The morning they arrive back home, the kids spill Dan and Charlie's pills and clumsily put them back in the wrong bottles, believing they remember where they belong.. This causes side effects for the both of them, with Dan not being able to speak and having odd sight perception during a golfing game with Craig and the possible Japanese co-workers, and Charlie's face freezing in a smile along with a neverending appetite while he is trying to woo the attractive American-Japanese translator Amanda at her grandmother's funeral, which results in him grinning as Amanda is grieving and crying along with eating grandmother's last famous rhubarb pie which she made within the last hours of her life.

Dan, Charlie, and the kids all become one big happy family, and Dan learns how to appreciate his kids and even have fun with them. Charlie recruits Jimmy Lunchbox, a world famous children's entertainer (who Charlie has been friends with for years) to help Dan make-believe he is a superhero/king for his daughter Emily who wants a protector in her life. Charlie meets up with Jimmy Lunchbox backstage at one of his shows and asks for his help. Lunchbox agrees to the deal but asks if his latest idea be kept a secret. The next day, Jimmy Lunchbox straps Dan and Charlie in motion control puppet suits and Dan has a tea party with Emily (while Jimmy Lunchbox and Charlie watch in another room via hidden camera). When the party goes wrong, Dan gives a heartfelt apology to Emily but it makes Charlie and Jimmy Lunchbox emotional. Afterwards, Dan accomplishes all the tasks his son wrote down on his "Dad List". All is splendid when Vicki comes home, possibly wanting to reunite the family for good by rekindling her and Dan's long gone flame.

The Japanese corporation blends with Dan and Charlie's, and they happily send Craig off to Tokyo. However, when Craig ditches his first day, the overseas corp. is still willing to work with them but only if Dan and Charlie move to Tokyo instead of Craig. Dan must leave Vicki and the children, whom he promised he would spend their next birthday with, and boards the plane with Charlie.

During their first meeting, Charlie wows them with his charm and then lets Dan dive into his business speech. Dan's laptop accidentally opens up a home video of him, Vicki, and the kids and he is unable to stay, boarding the next plane and supposedly ending his friendship with Charlie. When they arrive home, Dan finds Vicki and the kids have gone back to Vermont, and Charlie is disappointed to find that Lucky has died in the dog hotel, leaving Dan a message saying he is indifferent to whether Dan comes to the funeral or not. Craig calls as well, apologizing for his ways and asking for a second chance. Dan arrives at Lucky's funeral with a puppy in tow, and the two friends make up, desperately trying to get to Vermont in time for the kid's birthday along with Craig who tags along. The trio are not allowed into the party, which is held in the zoo, and must sneak in through the gorilla enclosure. Dan and Charlie escape, while Craig is left behind.

Dan and Charlie make it out of the gorilla enclosure and into the penguin exhibit, where the penguin's attack Charlie as Dan hurries away. After once again finding he will not be able to make it to the party, he spots a superhero who has been hired by Vicki to fly in, as Emily wanted a superhero. Dan pays the man to let him fly in instead, and does so just as Charlie escapes from the penguins.

Dan makes it just in time, putting smiles on his loved one's faces until he crashes into a nearby pond and is whisked away to a hospital. There, him, Vicki, and the kids make up and promise to be a family as Dan has bought a house in Vermont so he can be near them. Charlie enters the excitement making for a happy ending, with Craig sitting precautiously in the gorilla's lap having never escaped.

The film closes with footage of the group one year later on Charlie's new boat which he is having child proofed (as Dan had Charlie's apartment done earlier in the film), as Charlie is married to Amanda and has a three month old daughter with her. Dan and Vicki are back together, along with Craig who is like an uncle to the kids, and Lucky Jr. who pants happily in the corner. The "child proof people" are downstairs in the boat while the happy families above are taking pictures, and they accidentally spill both families' pills in the sink. One asks if they should tell, and the other reluctantly replies, "I think I remember where they go" as they hastily put the pills in the wrong bottles, the last picture showing the whole lot with obnoxiously large, frozen grins on their faces: one of the side effects as Craig, who is taking the photos, remarks, "Maybe not that big of a smile".

this film is haliorus