Written by Becca Choi, a passionate dog person and proud plant mom living in sunny Los Angeles.
Her first ever pet was a lovable Husky-Shepard mix named Marley, but her favorite breed will always be dachshunds!
Originally bred as badger hunters in Germany, dachshunds are a lovable breed, well-known for much, much more than their hunting skills.
Their adorable oblong bodies, large floppy ears, and short legs make dachshunds an iconic breed that you’ll spot on the streets—and in movies.
Here are 15 must-see films (and the doxies featured in them!) for dachshund lovers.
Buddy from The Secret Life of Pets (2016)
Buddy is the animated smooth-haired, black and tan doxie from The Secret Life of Pets.
He loves electric mixer massages, squeaky toys, and butterflies.
Voiced by Hannibal Buress, Buddy is a fan-favorite with his extra-long body and laid-back attitude.
If you loved Buddy in the first movie, you should know that he makes a reappearance as a supporting character in The Secret Life of Pets 2.
Slink from Toy Story (1995)
Next on the list is another famous animated dachshund: Slink from Toy Story.
This toy doxie has a gravelly Southern accent, a slinky for a stomach, and an extremely loyal personality.
Known to have a tragic backstory, he’s Woody’s sidekick despite being one of the more unpopular toys in Andy’s collection.
Slinky reappears in all four of the other Toy Story sequels, along with Andy’s non-toy dachshund, Buster.
Mocha from The Art of Self Defense (2019)
In The Art of Self Defense, Jesse Eisenberg plays a timid guy, Casey, who hopes to learn how not to be afraid. Mocha the dachshund plays Casey’s dog in the movie.
Mocha’s owner, Latifa Meena, is a professional animal communicator who talks to animals psychically—seriously.
Latifa Meena users her gift to help others, and she even has a one-of-a-kind animal communication course certified by the US Department of Education.
Odie from Garfield: The Movie (2004)
Although Odie from the classic Garfield cartoons was thought to be a beagle by many, he was played by a tan wire-haired dachshund in the live-action film from 2004.
In the Garfield movie, Odie’s introduction to Garfield and Jon’s life causes chaos, despite Odie’s lovable and playful nature.
Odie and Garfield both star in the sequel Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties (2006).
Shelly from Wiener Dog Nationals (2013)
In Wiener Dog Nationals, Shelly, the runt of her litter, is adopted from a shelter and takes on the greatest wiener dog competition of all time: Wienerschnitzel’s “Wiener Dog Nationals.”
If you love seeing dachshunds on-screen, Wiener Dog Nationals is a must-see movie.
Most movies with dachshunds feature minor characters, but this one sees live-action doxies as both main and supporting characters!
Follow Shelley, the underdog, as she braves the competition like no other.
And there’s good news. Shelley reappears in the sequel, Wiener Dog Internationals (2017).
Wilhelmina, Heidi, and Chloe from The Ugly Dachshund (1966)
The classic American film, The Ugly Dachshund, is really about a Great Dane named Brutus, who believes he is a dachshund after being rescued by a couple and raised alongside Wilhelmina, Heidi, and Chloe’s dachshund mom, Danke.
This classic comedy follows the three mischievous dachshund puppies as they create chaos for Brutus.
The Competitors from Wiener Takes All: A Dogumentary (2007)
This dachshund documentary follows various dachshunds as they compete across the globe to see who will reign top dog.
There are tons of doxies in this film who try to trot and race their way to victory in competitions like the Wiener Nationals and the Westminster Dog Show.
If you want a behind-the-scenes look at the political world of competitive dachshunds, you need to check out Wiener Takes All: A Dogumentary.
Betty’s Dog from The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)
In the opening scene of this Alfred Hitchcock film, the main character Betty is holding a dachshund that wriggles out of her arms.
A runaway skier almost hits the dog before Betty saves him.
Of the near disaster, the girl scolds the “silly little dog” shortly before the skier is mysteriously murdered.
The Man Who Knew Too Much was released in 1934 when Alfred Hitchcock was still an amateur.
He later released a much different film sans dachshunds under the same title in 1956.
Sparky from Frankenweenie (2012)
In this spooky Tim Burton film, the plot centers around a boy’s not-so-dead dog, who he brings back to life in a lab.
The dachshund-like Frankenweenie is playful and kind, but his rise from the dead brings unintended consequences.
Little Hope from Weiner-Dog (2016)
This movie is a spinoff from an earlier 1995 film, Welcome to the Dollhouse, where the main Wiener-Dog is actually a human girl named Dawn Wiener.
In Wiener-Dog, a 2016 remake with stars like Danny DeVito and Ellen Burstyn, Dawn Wiener reappears as a veterinary nurse.
The plot follows Wiener-Dog, aka Little Hope, as the dog is pushed between various homes throughout the movie before a tragic ending that critics ridicules as gruesome and cruel.
Dachsie from The Lady and the Tramp (1955)
Although he’s not the main character, there is a dachshund in The Lady and the Tramp.
Voiced by Bill Thompson, Dachsie is a stray male dachshund with a German accent who Lady meets at the pound.
His small, slender body and big ears suggest that he’s a miniature dachshund, and his coat is red.
Elsa’s Dachshund from The Lady from Shanghai (1947)
Starring Rita Hayworth and Orson Welles, The Lady from Shanghai is a complex film noir thriller—and it features an adorable doxie as a very minor character.
One of the main characters, Elsa, has a pet dachshund, who is notably seen on a yacht during the film.
Did you know that the dog actually belonged to one of the other cast members, Errol Flynn (and so did the yacht)?
The “Rats” from Deadly Eyes (1982)
Deadly Eyesis a Canadian horror film about monstrous rats who terrorize the people of Toronto after eating grain contaminated with steroids.
The rats in this movie are actually dachshunds wearing rat suits.
If you think about it, dachshunds do look a little bit like supersized rodents—in a cute way.
Adolphus from Grand Hotel (1932)
Grand Hotel is an oldie that centers around a baron with a problematic reputation.
His dog gets a negative reputation as well since the baron would rather coddle his handsome black dachshund Adolphus than interact with anyone else.
The Cartoon Pup from The Artist’s Dreams (1913)
The Artist’s Dreamsi s a silent short film that’s over 100 years old, and it holds one of the earliest depictions of a dachshund ever seen in a movie.
In a short scene, we see a cartoonist draw an animated dachshund.
When he walks away, the doxie jumps off the page into “real” life to eat a plate of sausages.
A Fun Fact About the History of Dachshunds in Film
During World War II, dachshunds fell out of favor with the American public, thanks to their popularity among Kaiser Wilhelm II.
This could be why we see a big gap in feature films with dachshunds and why doxies are portrayed in a largely negative light in most live-action films to this day.
After WWII, the American Kennel Club tried to rebrand dachshunds as badger dogs and liberty pups, but the German name stuck.
Round-Up: 8 Must-See Movies with Dachshunds
There you have it!
These 15 movies aren’t all the movies with dachshunds out there, but they are some of the most iconic.
For my recommendation on the best dachshund movies to watch, here are the films to add to your list, starting with the best first:
1. The Secret Life of Pets (2016)
2. The Toy Story Series (1995, 1999, 2010, 2019)
5. Wiener Takes All: A Dogumentary (2007)
6. Wiener Dog Nationals (2013)
8. The Art of Self Defense (2019)
Photo by Nivia Espinoza on Unsplash.