[Rating: Swiss Fist]
For almost 50 years, a lovable, lazy and sassy cat named Garfield has embraced himself in comic strip and pop culture lore. The orange tabby who hates Mondays, and loves lasagna has made a name for himself through his comic strips, various television shows and specials and two live action movies. He’s back in his first theatrical animated flick aptly titled The Garfield Movie where he’s able to have his origin story.
Directed by Mark Dindal (who directed one of my favorite animated films, The Emperor’s New Groove), Garfield (Chris Pratt) tells his origin story. As a kitten who is abandoned, he is found by Jon Arbuckle (Nicholas Hoult) who quickly discovers Garfield’s ferocious appetite. Garfield tells that he let Jon adopt a pet, canine Odie (Harvey Guillén) and the three have lived happily together ever since. One night, Garfield and Odie are cat-napped by two dogs Roland (Brett Goldstein) and Nolan (Bowen Yang). The cat and dog duo are saved however, by none other than Garfield’s long abandoned FATHER, Vic (Samuel L. Jackson). However, this reunion is cut short and set up by the cunning Jinx (Hannah Waddingham) who has a background with Vic.
Jinx wants to have Garfield, Odie and Vic steal milk for her, as revenge for her time in the pound thanks to Vic. Her plans include having the trio steal enough milk to match how long she spent in the slammer. To aid in their quest, they recruit a bull, Otto (Ving Rhames) whose expertise in the milk factory might just help out the trio, if Garfield and Vic can get past their tepid past and a crazed security guard Marge (Cecily Strong).
In 2004, Garfield was made into a live action movie with Bill Murray as the voice. Honestly, despite that movie being total trash, Murray’s voice was perfect for the cat. Chris Pratt’s voice (by the way, when did we decide he was the go-to voice actor?) is terribly fine. It just sounds like Pratt and there’s no soul in the cat. At least with Murray, I believed he was this lazy cat.
The animation of this movie is pretty cute. I loved the bright colors, but nothing really stood out to me as new or inventive. The plot also, once the plan to steal milk is set in motion could have been resolved in a crisp ninety minutes, but instead spends a bit more time to really plan things out. I was wondering why this had to be long for a plot that’s very thin, and very familiar.
All in all, Garfield the Movie is just fine. There’s not too many complaints about it because it’s just a simple movie made for families and lovers of the cat. It made me super hungry for a lasagna, so if that was the goal, bravo!
Christian Ramos is a classic film fan, having had the dream to host Turner Classic Movies for years now. He also has a large amount of Oscar trivia in his head, remembers dressing as Groucho Marx one Halloween, and cherishes the moment Julianne Moore liked his tweet.
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