EDITOR’S NOTE: The Daring Dobermans was on the CBS Late Movie on May 9, 1975, July 29, 1976 and September 9, 1977.
Following up on The Doberman Gang, director Byron Ross Chudnow returns for The Daring Dobermans, proving once and for all that while humans are greedy, incompetent and thoroughly corrupt, canine actors wearing collar tags will always be the most professional people on set. All good boys.
Without giving away the ending of the first film, let’s just say our favorite four-legged felons didn’t retire to a nice farm upstate. At the start of The Daring Dobermans, the pack is still out in the wilderness, pockets full of loot. Law enforcement and trigger-happy vigilantes hunt them, but three working-stiff buddies—Greg (David Moses), Steve (Charles Knox Robinson), and Warren (Tim Considine)—hit the ultimate lottery. Greg cracks the code by using an oscillator to blast high-pitched frequencies that summon the dogs straight to them.
Bullshit science? Bullshit science.
Naturally, instead of doing the right thing, these three Einsteins decide the world really needs another dog-assisted heist. They set up a training facility out in the desert to rob a crooked politician’s campaign funds. Along the way, they cross paths with Billy (Claudio Martinez), a local Native American boy who loves animals and initially thinks they’re running a legitimate kennel. Fortunately, the script sidesteps the usual grating cute kid clichés, instead using Billy as a mirror to show just how morally bankrupt our human protagonists really are.
The Dobermans remain completely blameless, adorable and infinitely smarter than everyone else.
Is the plot more outlandish than the first movie? Absolutely. Are the characterizations thinner than a two-ply napkin? You bet. But The Daring Dobermans completely delivers whenever the dogs go to work. If you love 70s crime capers, canine co-stars, and a heavy dose of desert sleaze, this one is worth digging up.
Director Byron Ross Chudnow wasn’t just a filmmaker; he was a producer and composer who leaned heavily into the animal-adventure craze of the early ’70s. Beyond the Doberman trilogy (which concluded with The Amazing Dobermans in 1976, featuring Fred Astaire), Chudnow also brought us The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan’s Island.
Tim Considine (Warren) is an absolute legend of classic television and Disney history. Long before he was hanging out with criminal masterminds and Dobermans, he played Spin Evans on The Mickey Mouse Club, starred alongside Tommy Kirk in The Shaggy Dog and Old Yeller, and played eldest son Mike Douglas on My Three Sons. Hopefully, none of the dogs noticed he was in Old Yeller. And yes, George “Buck” Flower shows up.
