This fantasy and drama film is quite literally about a dog’s role in everyday life. Over the course of five decades, the same dog is reincarnated time and time again and gets to experience its long lasting impact on various owners throughout it’s lifetimes. I personally don’t like animal themed movies because I feel like it often hinders the writers from actually writing an enjoyable script and story, however, I feel like this movie didn’t fall victim to that too much. I would rate this movie 3/5 stars and recommend it to dog lovers everywhere who don’t mind very simple storylines.
@The_Reviewer of the Hamilton Public Library Teen Review Board

This was a very heart touching movie. This movie is about a dog who experiences different lives multiple times. It starts off with a puppy who finds a loving owner named Ethan. Ethan names the dog Bailey. Ethan and Bailey spend lots of time with each other and create loving, unforgettable, memories. One day, Ethan gets a scholarship and leaves. Bailey couldn't accept that. With that, he enters a new life. Basically, in every birth, he does something good for the owner. Although he loves most of his owners, he never forgets Ethan. By the end of the movie, it's been years. Bailey is wandering when he suddenly finds Ethan's home. Bailey has a new appearance but Ethan recognizes him due to a loving memory of theirs. They reunite! The ending is great. Something I don't like in this movie is that there isn't much of a unique story. It's pretty much one thing repeating over and over again. The movie could get pretty boring at times. It was a pretty sweet movie but it could have been much better. Apart from that, I would recommend watching this movie at least once -@Vanilla of the Teen Review Board at the Hamilton Public Library

Such a good movie!

A Dog's Purpose was such a sweet and heart touching movie which tells the tale of a dog and how he views life and its purpose. It was sweet and beautiful and I would watch it again and again. Loved it.

So, if the dog had lived two weeks in pain and died, would that be divine justice? Of course not. Same for people, right? Purgatory fixes it all up, right? Uhm, wait, what about all the learning that more life experience would provide, including all about love? What if life was fair - only because that's how we would actually learn unconditional love? EG: Fairness provided to you "free" - albeit karma is not always a fun thing but insures perpetual responsibility with no "free lunch"- thereby providing the learning. Uhm... "Purpose" (Oh, just like in the title! ;-) Now see, here's a story that's beautiful and all those wonderful things the reviewers said, and uses the 1st person of a dog to refer back to his previous lifetimes (ok, once it was HER previous lifetime), although at first, he didn't remember much, but the capacity to remember in various ways kept increasing each lifetime. I thought that was very well done. As keeping the tissue handy (and which was practically soaked by movies end). By the way, it was just a very good movie, NO metaphysical hoo-ha needed! :-)

Very heartwarming movie. I would highly recommend.

Four different dog lives are portrayed by one dog's apparent experience in being reborn. There are some touching moments, and then some that are a bit maudlin.

While there are significant differences between the movie and book, they are all perfectly replaced. The book is better, but only because it is several hours longer to read, so it covers more ground, and more in-depth. But what both cover, is very well done. Highly recommended.

A dog movie that makes you cry *happy* tears.
The movie version changed and simplified a few things from the book (which I also strongly recommend), including changing the ending a little bit, but it stays true to the heart of the novel. A very sweet and loving story.

I am huge dog and animal lover. I checked this out but almost returned it without watching because I read some reviews that said it was a tearjerker in a sad way. I kept putting off, honestly not knowing if I could handle seeing a dog die, even in a pretend situation. I bucked up a few days before it was due back to the library and I'm glad I watched it.

While I do not believe in reincarnation, I did find this entertaining. God certainly had a purpose for creating dogs - to give unconditional love, loyalty, service (police dogs, emotional support, medical support, etc.), comfort AND JOY into our lives. This story was a way to explain those purposes, just look beyond the reincarnation thing.
It was just me and my dog(s) for a number of years so I can totally relate to this movie.
This movie had sad moments but made up for those with happy times.... and without giving a total spoiler - and so you won't be afraid to watch it - it didn't end sad. I took a chance that it would be a happy ending and all the tears shed during this movie were definitely NOT sad.

This has made me think about what my own sweet 7 year old dog thinks when I leave the house, when he's following me, when he is playing with the cat, etc. My boy is very smart and knows words. I can totally appreciate what the dog trainers did to train these "acting" dogs.
Yes, I would recommend this movie. It was worth the time.

cant wait to see this!