Eight Below

This is a fun film that will appeal to a wide range of demographics (although it's too intense for young kids) | Andrew Coffin

Disneyfication" is often used as a pejorative, and with good reason. At its worst, the suffocating layers of cutesiness result in disasters like Snow Dogs, Disney's 2002 sled racing farce with Cuba Gooding Jr. But Disney has also had success with live-action family adventures, like 1991's Jack London adaptation, White Fang, with Ethan Hawke.

Disney's latest live-action venture, Eight Below (rated PG for some peril and brief mild language) is yet another dogs-in-the-snow film that falls resoundingly in the latter category. A couple of mild profanities (as in "what the hell?") are all that mar this exciting, well-produced adventure.

Eight Below is based on a 1983 Japanese film called Nankyoku Monogatari (or Antarctica), which was itself based on a true story of sled dogs left to survive on their own when their handlers were evacuated from the icy continent in 1957. As expected, the Disney version gets the Disney treatment (among other changes, more of the dogs survive than in the historical account) but the tale is handled with enough subtlety and solid, straightforward storytelling to remain a thrilling adventure.