Although it suffers from being overly sentimental & comes off as emotionally manipulative on few occasions, Hachi: A Dog's Tale still qualifies as an affectionately crafted tearjerker that has a lot of warmth, cuteness & heart but purely from a story perspective, all it tries to do is to force its viewers to fall in love with its premise by using their sensitivity for a cute dog as its strength & eventually succeeds.
Based on a true story of the now legendary Japanese dog named Hachikō & his well-known loyalty to his master, Hachi: A Dog's Tale is the Americanised version of the same story & concerns an abandoned dog who is found at a train station by a local professor; who takes him home & eventually adopts him. The story covers their budding relationship and Hachi's faithfulness & endless wait for his master when an unexpected tragedy strikes.
Nicely directed, finely photographed & evocatively scored, the film doesn't have much to offer other than the adventures of our titular character which probably is enough to make most of its viewers go "aww" at various moments & forget about every other shortcoming the film has. There are times when you genuinely feel for what's portrayed in the film but then there are also moments when it feels like the film is trying too hard to make us react in a certain manner.
The dog in itself is given a special treatment as if it's some extraordinarily gifted pet possessing an ideal personality & is shown as a mystifying character who never really does what other members of its species generally do. I'm not denying that Hachikō never happened but I'm not really sold by its portrayal in this film at least. Also chipping useful contribution to the film is Richard Gere as the professor who found Hachi and his bonding with the dog is the core element that drives this film.
To be honest, I'm not really surprised by the positive reception this movie has received ever since its release. After all, who doesn't love dogs? Well, I don't... not since the one that bit me when I was a kid although that crazy son of a bitch died a few days later so that cheered me up back then. Anyway, on an overall scale, Hachi: A Dog's Tale is a heartwarming & heartbreaking story of faith, devotion & undying love that guarantees a lot of tears to its audience & successfully delivers it for most.