“Max” is a film about a military working dog who is adopted by the little brother of his fallen marine handler. Films with animal lead characters are tricky. Many of them are manipulative – they expose easy heartstrings and yank on them until the audience is in tears. Not that there’s anything inherently wrong with that; a good comedy finds the funny bone and taps on it for the entire film. That said, drama and comedy are two very different masks. Finding an exposed dramatic nerve and stimulating it for the sake of stimulating it can achieve the desired result, but the experience is somewhat diminished.

The base set-up of a military dog who lost his handler and who suffers from PTSD isn’t a bad set-up at all. Unfortunately for “Max,” the constant heartstring-pulling acts as a poor substitute for quality filmmaking – kind of like putting ketchup on a poor steak. Sure, it makes it taste better, but it certainly doesn’t make it a better steak.

There are a lot of pieces of “Max” that are just unlikeable. The human cast members are largely forgettable and in some cases are just plain irritating. The not overly complex plot is aided by lazy writing and unfinished thoughts. The biggest disappointment is the abundance of squandered potential. A mainstream film about military working dogs doing their jobs, that sounds great. A former military dog adapting to a new family, that’s fine. The director/writer combo of Boaz Yakin (director of “Remember the Titans” and a bunch of duds) and Sheldon Lettich (who is writing for the first time in nine years) weren’t able to find a good mix of those two concepts.

I love animals, and I love good movies about animals. “Max” is certainly a movie about an animal, but it’s not a good movie about an animal. Therein lies a subtle distinction that I care about as a critic; however, if your pet dictates when you do and do not use your electronic devices, such as a laptop or tablet, then “Max” just may pull on your heartstrings.

3 of 6 stars