My favorite food has always been lasagna. All those special noodles, layers of cheese and ricotta, beef, sausage, sauce, and more cheese into an absolutely perfect dish. Furthermore, if you let the dish sit overnight in the refrigerator, it was somehow even better than the day before. Unfortunately, lack of true gluten-free options for lasagna noodles (Barilla makes one, but they are hard to find) and nobody to really make it for beside myself (my wife and son are lactose intolerant) have created a situation where I haven’t had a true lasagna in years. But perhaps with today’s film review of Garfield, I can find the inspiration to recreate my favorite dish. Let’s take a look at the movie.
For a lot of cat owners, I’m sure their realized horror is their feline learning how to use a cell phone. Apparently Garfield (voiced by Chris Pratt) has this down pat, as he uses it to order Mamma Leoni’s via drone delivery. Meanwhile, Odie (voiced by Gregg Berger) barks for a treat, which he quickly receives. In a few moments, a drone arrives with a pizza for Garfield. Several seconds later, the pizza is eaten as if Garfield was a paper shredder. That should tide him over until breakfast.
It’s time for a flashback to when Garfield was a kitten, out on the streets with a small cardboard box to call home. On this particular night it’s dark and stormy, and a voice from the darkness calls him junior and tells him that he will be right back. Left to fend for himself, Garfield struggles against the elements. The feline smells the sweet, inviting aroma of pizza and decides to investigate.
The source of the pizza is Mama Leoni, an Italian eatery. At one of the tables, Jon Arbuckle (voiced by Nicholas Hoult) sits alone looking at the families enjoying their food while he waits for his dinner. The pizza makes its way to his table, and he grabs a slice. As he starts to take a bite, he is surprised by Garfield from the outside window looking hungrily at Jon’s food. After a moment, he opens up the window when no one is looking to let the kitten inside. At first, Jon offers Garfield a mere pepperoni. But after the cat tastes the spicy morsel, he eats the entire pizza in no time flat.
However, Garfield is not merely satisfied by one pizza; he then takes to cleaning plates left behind by other restaurant patrons. So much so that Jon is forced to order a family-style lasagna to go. Eventually, Jon and Garfield are able to leave, and Jon tries to part ways with the feline. Garfield gives the waterworks, and Jon can’t say no. The rest is history. That’s the history of how Garfield came to live with Jon. Let’s hit those credits.
We learn a little more about Garfield’s life. How he grew up with Odie. How the cat absolutely hates Mondays. How to get a chair with functional speakers and leg room. But that pampered and perfect life of one orange tabby would change forever when late one night he and his dog Odie would get taken by two fierce dogs named Roland (voiced by Brett Goldstein) and Nolan (voiced by Bowen Yang). Will Garfield and Odie be able to escape?
It’s a pretty good film, I enjoyed the voice acting for the most part (I’m not sure if I will ever get on board with celebrities doing the major parts, but it seems to be here to stay). The story moves along well. I did not notice any lags in the action on-screen, and everything moves at a nice pace. My favorite character from the movie probably isn’t Garfield, but a bull that lives at Lactose Farms named Otto (voiced by Ving Rhames). Another well done character was Jinx (voiced by Hannah Waddingham), who plays the primary antagonist (an evil cat) of the film.
But what most viewers might be asking themselves, besides where to get a recliner with built in speakers, is how does this movie treat the source material? After all, Garfield has a rich history dating all the way back to the late 1970’s and has been in countless comic strips, cartoons, and movies along with a boatload of merchandising from the suction-cup car plush to the wireless earbuds I found yesterday at the Five Below (which work very well, by the way). I mean, after all, how hard is it to screw up an orange cat with a penchant to overeat Italian food and sleep a lot?
Apparently, fairly easy. Yes, Garfield is still overweight and eats lots of Italian food, but most everything else is skewed in some fashion. The elephant in the room has to be, well, Vic (voiced by Samuel L. Jackson) who gets the most on-screen time next to Garfield and Odie. He’s not part of Garfield lore, and honestly sticks out like a sore thumb. The character was seemingly created for the sole need of extra comic relief and for a few tugs of the audience’s heartstrings.
In fact when it comes actual Garfield lore, apparently no one really did their homework. There was no Arlene, Nermal, Doc Boy (which would have made one hundred percent sense in the plotline), or anyone else you might associate with Garfield. No one from US Acres (another Jim Davis comic strip, and also the second short of every Garfield and Friends episode), either which would have also made ridiculous sense. There were several blink-and-miss-them moments involving Pookie (Garfield’s teddy bear), Liz (Jon’s girlfriend and Garfield’s vet), and Binky the Clown (who shows up on a cereal box), but they are hardly worth mentioning.
One might ask themselves, why did they leave so many things out? Well, the fairly simple answer, even if I don’t like it, is that they put Garfield in a fish-out-of-water scenario. Basically, to use a term from one of his TV specials, he’s “In the Rough.” They also made him to have no real intelligence, and any trouble he gets into he escapes because of luck and no other reason. As someone who has read a lot of Garfield comic strips, he has many intelligent moments, something that was not exhibited during the course of this film. There were also several spots where I felt the writers got into a tough spot and then they created something ridiculous to keep the plot moving.
Despite the criticism, Garfield made over $30 million during Memorial Day weekend, about the same as the newest installment in the Mad Max franchise. Furthermore, thanks to an early release overseas, it is already close to $100 million worldwide. I would not be surprised if it got close to $250, maybe even $300 million in its final worldwide tally. It’s a decent movie for its entertainment value, and my family enjoyed it, but I really felt the writers didn’t go to the same class that say the Super Mario Bros ones did, because it was quite disposable. Recommended for the children, but probably not for the diehard Garfield fans.
By the way, if you have read this far (thank you), two bonus reasons to stay for the credits. One is a an original song for Jinx during the credits (why it wasn’t in the actual movie is something I can’t figure out), and then a little comic-strip-type Easter egg after everything is said and done. Enjoy.
