At least it is in William Wegman's rarely-seen short film "The Hardly Boys in Hardly Gold." The movie, shot on location in Maine, is a wonderfully amusing parody of Franklin Dixon's "Hardy Boys" series of mystery novels.

As is made clear by the film's poster, the Hardly Boys are hardly boys; they are girls and dogs. Wegman, best known as the photographer who dresses his weimaraners up as people, takes the dogs-as-people motif into the space of narrative filmmaking.

The film introduces to the Hardly family, who own an inn in Maine that is open during the summers. Father Hardly is an avid fisherman, mother a golfer. This leaves the Boys, and their good friend Chip, to practice sleuthing. We are told that, during the previous summer, the Boys saved the town of Rangely from a cruise missile threat.... what kind of nefarious scheme will they face this year? Whatever it is, the Boys, armed with a scientific rock analyzer and heightened dog powers, will surely be up to the task.... or will they?

Clearly you didn't live with me in college. A VHS copy of this movie made its way into our dorm freshman year (by way of the somewhat mythical figure that is Karl Voigtland), and we watched it and watched it and watched it. We made everyone we knew watch it.

Despite making it into Sundance, the film is not one you are just going to stumble on randomly. Thankfully, the DVD was released this year, complete with audio commentary and all those bells and whistles. It is now available from Amazon and Netflix.

What do you have to lose? The runtime is about 30 minutes, so it's not a huge chunk of time. If you are a Netflix member it's a no-brainer, just add it to your queue. If you know me and live close enough, simply make a phone call -- I will watch this movie anytime, anywhere.

Seriously, if you are into off-kilter humor, dogs, the Hardy Boys, or just plain absurdity, it does not get much better than this. Wegman's monotone narration and voice acting really seals the deal.