I’m a Garfield fan. Yes sir, I love that orange fat cat. The comic books were pure innocent humor for adults and kids, and the animated series is classic, so I was expecting a lot of fun with the live action movie despite my surprise. In its own unusual way, “Garfield: The Movie” can be fun; it’s a guilty pleasure and has a lot of the usual innocent fun and Garfield is Garfield here. From the lasagna addiction, the laziness, his teddy bear Pooky, and his snide attitude and smug persona that makes him the fat cat I knew. And voicing him really well is the always talented Bill Murray, who sounds like he’s having a lot of fun doing Garfield. He’s a great successor to Lorenzo Music, who was the definitive voice of Garfield.
He’s very appropriate for the role of Garfield, so Murray is a sport and does a great job for the voice of Garfield. And most of the time this movie can also be faithful to the original comic books with John being outwitted by Garfield, and Odie (played by a real dog). The antics are there as they have the love-hate relationship Garfield fans love to love, and its fun to watch all the hijinks between them. The humor is still there with some really funny sequences including the scene where Garfield switches John’s food, Garfield torturing John relentlessly, and the last scenes of the film where Garfield keeps pushing Odie off the couch which just had me chuckling.
All the while the spirit of Garfield is very resonant here and I couldn’t help but like this movie and see it as an innocent way to kill some time. That said, aside from Murray, I was disappointed me by every reach of my expectations, and yes I saw the trailer, and I had expectations that maybe, possibly, this would be a manifestation of my beloved Garfield on the screen. But it wasn’t. I can forgive the mere inconsistencies shown by the trailer, but I entered this optimistically and hopeful, and was just let down. My first omen should have been a sign to my common sense when I saw in the trailer this movie is headed by two bland actors: Breckin Meyer, and Jennifer Love Hewitt, and they never rise above being anything but sub-par.
Meyer completely miscast as John, as in both the comics and cartoon, John was a nerdy, neurotic, and really geeky cartoonist who constantly tussled with Garfield almost as adversaries, and it’s not shown here. John is not a cartoonist (it’s never shown what he does for a living), and the way Meyer portrays him is often as nerdy, impish, and a major pushover subjecting himself to Garfield’s tyranny which is never really emphasized on. Murray is great as Garfield and sounds like he’s having fun doing it, but “Garfield: The Movie” fails to match Murray’s energy at every turn. Garfield fans will just be better off watching the 1988 animated series or sticking to the original comic strips.