Review #689: Garfield: The Movie.
Cast
Bill Murray (Garfield), Breckin Meyer (Jon Arbuckle), Jennifer Love Hewitt (Dr. Liz Wilson), Stephen Tobolowsky (Happy Chapman), Nick Cannon (Louis), and Alan Cumming (Persnikitty) Directed by Peter Hewitt (#022 - Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey and #287 - The Borrowers)
Review
A movie based off a long running comic strip? What could go wrong? And...nothing really goes wrong, but nothing goes right either. Garfield the comic strip is a best a mild read better suited for a Sunday read when nothing good is on but you're out of books (someone who is out of books to read? What is this, 1995?) Turning it into a movie may not be the best use of resources, and the movie proves just that. The main reason that the movie falls short is that it doesn't have much to offer and manages to be just as breeze worthy like the comic. Murray is not a bad Garfield, but when your main voice actor is only in this because he thought the movie was written by a Coen brother and confused them with Joel Cohen, that's saying something beneath the surface. The rest of the characters are more or less forgettable, with Meyer and Hewitt's characters being more standard "lovey-dovy" cliche than actual full fledged people. Actually, their characterization is more 2-D than 3-D, so props for making them comic-like? And our villain? The only notable thing he does is that he intends to use a shock collar on Odie. I realize that sounds weird to list that, but other than that, he is standard stuff, though at least Tobolowsky tries his best to make him sound interesting. The movie could be better for younger audiences, though it wears itself out after a while. Overall, the movie isn't inherently terrible, it's just not anything special. It can't even qualify as a terrible movie, it just reigns as a middle of the road movie. I'd stick to the comic...or reading the parody web comic Garfield Minus Garfield.
Overall, I give it 5 out of 10 stars.
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