Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
Starring: Bill Murray, Breckin Meyer, Jennifer Love Hewitt
Directed by: Pete Hewitt
Cat Out of the Bag Alert! This review contains some spoilers for this film!
Synopsis: Jon Davis’ comic strip cat comes to life for the big screen in this film which blends animation with live action. Garfield (voiced by Bill Murray) is distressed when his owner Jon Arbuckle (Breckin Meyer) brings home a dog named Odie. But when Odie goes missing and ends up in the hands of a less-than-scrupulous television personality Garfield must travel to the big city to rescue him.
Cartoon Cat: This movie adapation of the beloved comic strip is sadly a misfire in many ways.
One of the most distracting elements is that while Garfield is CGI animation all the other animals in the film are live action, which seems odd at best and annoying at worst.
Kitty Cameos: However, this does allow for some beautiful real cats to be featured. The most notable of these is the Siamese cat playing Nermal. But wait . . . wasn’t Nermal an adorable gray tabby kitten in the comic? Also in this film Nermal is a youngish cat (definitely not a kitten) and somewhat dim.
Then there is Arlene, the pink cat Garfield sometimes woos in the comic strip. Here she is played by a Russian Blue cat.
The other notable cat is Persnikitty (voiced by Alan Cumming), the proud tuxedo cat who was the television personality Happy Chapman’s (Stephen Tobolowsky) co-star despite the man’s allergies. When Happy gets hold of Odie, he throws Persnikitty into the pound where he meets Garfield and even helps him and the other animals to escape.
Various cats can be seen in scenes at the veterinarian’s office and at the pound. But Garfield remains the focus of the film and while he does complain about Monday and eats too much lasagna there’s sadly little else that resembles the original comics.
Final Mewsings: Garfield’s animated specials and TV show were great. This movie, not so much.
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