There is no corrupting Garfield because he never had any integrity to speak of. When everyone’s favourite hit the big time in the 1980s,part of his novelty lay in his lack of any traits deeper than a craving for lasagne,a loathing of Mondays and a snarky point of view.
Garfield (voiced by Chris Pratt) in The Garfield Movie.Sony Pictures
Here was the perfect hero for the Me Decade,in contrast to the hippie-era soul-searching of the Peanuts gang. His indolence fit especially well into the shrunken space of the modern newspaper comic strip,where he would commonly sit around for three or four panels doing very little,as he still does today.
This minimalism has long translated smoothly to TV animation,but for better or worse,a few tweaks have been made in Mark Dindal’sThe Garfield Movie (not to be confused withGarfield:The Movie,a live-action-animation hybrid released in 2004,in which Bill Murray voiced our feline friend).
The new big-screen Garfield is still a glutton for dairy products,and still not keen on getting out of the house. But he’s a significantly more upbeat,energetic personality (his voice is supplied by Chris Pratt,sounding only mildly different from his take on Mario inThe Super Mario Bros. Movie).
Indeed,his entire household has been given a makeover of sorts. His owner Jon (Nicholas Hoult) is less of a pathetic nerd,more of a kindly benefactor,and Odie the dog (Harvey Guillen) has gone from drooling cretin to repository of Zen wisdom,albeit still expressed through wordless yapping.
John (voiced by Nicholas Hoult) with baby Garfield in The Garfield Movie.Sony Pictures
God help us,the movie even has an arc that sees Garfield addressing the psychological issues underlying his food addiction and lack of motivation,most of them linked to Vic (Samuel L. Jackson) the lowlife dad who abandoned him as a kitten.
The chance to work through their differences comes when they’re kidnapped by Jinx (Hannah Waddingham),a villainous Persian cat who wants them for a heist at a high-tech dairy farm. As if the plot didn’t incorporate enough father figures,they’re trained for this task by the farm’s former mascot,a gruff bull named Otto (Ving Rhames;yes,this is some kind ofPulp Fiction reunion).
Despite our hero’s newfound sensitivity,pundits who fret about children being exposed to woke values can rest easy. There are no sympathetic female characters of any species,aside from an angelic cow named Ethel (Alicia Grace Turrell) who barely speaks.
There is,however,an abundance of product placement,a stream of greeting-card one-liners such as “Cheese is my love language” and a fair number of sight gags more or less blatantly lifted from precursors such asThe Secret Life of Pets andChicken Run.
The children at the preview I attended watched mostly in solemn silence,beyond occasional titters at Garfield slamming into a tree or landing head-first in a pile of manure. Even those high points have little to do with the character I grew up being mildly amused by. But as that character used to say,“Big fat hairy deal”. What more is there to add?
The Garfield Movie is released in cinemas on May 30.
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