THE GARFIELD MOVIE (2024)

Genre: CG Animation
Director: Mark Dindal
Cast: Chris Pratt, Samuel L. Jackson, Hannah Waddingham, Ving Rhames, Nicholas Hoult, Cecily Strong, Harvey Guillén, Brett Goldstein, Bowen Yang, Snoop Dogg
Runtime: 1 hr 41 mins
Rating: PG
Released By: Sony Pictures
Official Website: https://www.TheGarfield-Movie.com

Opening Day: 22 May 2024

Synopsis: Garfield (voiced by Chris Pratt), the world-famous, Monday-hating, lasagna-loving indoor cat, is about to have a wild outdoor adventure! After an unexpected reunion with his long-lost father – scruffy street cat Vic (voiced by Samuel L. Jackson) – Garfield and his canine friend Odie are forced from their perfectly pampered life into joining Vic in a hilarious, high-stakes heist. 

Movie Review:

As if the two live-action/CGI Garfield movies weren’t awful enough, the lasagna loving orange kitty is back in a totally new animated full-length feature voiced by Chris Pratt.

Not to be confused with another comic strip orange cat, Heathcliff, The Garfield Movie gives you a brief history on how Jon Arbuckle (Nicholas Hoult) chanced upon the once cute kitten outside an Italian restaurant and went on to adopt him as his pet. Of course to no one surprise, the obese sarcastic Garfield insists it’s the other way round.

Knowing that it’s near impossible to adapt the daily comic strips by Jim Davis to the big screen, The Garfield Movie admittedly has to ripoff other better Pixar and DreamWorks Animation storylines to turn it into a perfunctory full-length animation. Thus, Garfield and his canine friend, Odie are dragged shortly into a high-stakes heist involving the former long-lost father, Vic (Samuel L. Jackson) and a bunch of villains headed by Jinx (Hannah Waddingham), a Persian cat, Roland (Brett Goldstein), a Shar Pei and Nolan (Bowen Yang), a small whippet.

To be brutally honest, The Garfield Movie has nothing much to do with the original Davis’ comic strip except the prologue where we see a very cute young Garfield. Arbuckle is mostly forgotten throughout. We don’t really see Dr Liz (except a brief cameo) or Garfield’s antagonist, Nermal. The screenplay focused heavily on Vic and the rest of the motley crew of misfits. So it comes as a blessing of sorts if you are not a vivid reader of the original comics.

In order to take revenge against Vic for abandoning her during a milk heist, Jinx resorts to kidnapping Garfield and forcing the estranged pair of father and son to penetrate into Lactose Farm to steal gallons of milk for her. Enlisting the help of the farm’s ex-mascot, Otto (Ving Rhames), Garfield, Vic and Odie must go through a series of Mission Impossible style obstacles making the third act a prolonged, frenetic chase. Indeed, The Garfield Movie takes a leaf out of Tom Cruise action movies that he is even given a shoutout in the process.

Director Mark Dindal’s last directorial movie was Disney’s Chicken Little and it seems he is still a master in terms of visual gimmicks with all the constant manic energy and sight gags to disguise the perpetually weak narrative. While the movie exudes some some old-fashioned fatherly love between Garfield and Vic, there isn’t much creativeness in the rest of the storytelling. The obvious nods to the comic strips are serviceable at best and frankly doesn’t do much to the younger audiences who probably has no idea Garfield actually exists originally on the newspaper rather than on a water bottle for example.

Adding to his ongoing voice acting resume as Mario and Emmet, Chris Pratt does resembles or at least sound like the orange obese cat if you are a sceptic. It’s true that the visual of The Garfield Movie lacks the vibrancy and details of Illumination, Pixar and Disney but it does contain enough crowd-pleasing action and jokes to qualify as a family movie. For better or worse, it’s much better and mildly enjoyable than the live-action ones.

Movie Rating:

(Though Garfield hates Mondays, it’s probably the best day to catch it where admissions are less pricey)

Review by Linus Tee