20th Anniversary TLDR: Garfield: The Movie (2004)
Once again, my life has been saved by the miracle of lasagna.
Plot: Garfield, the fat, lazy, lasagna lover, has everything a cat could want. But when Jon, in an effort to impress the Liz - the vet and an old high-school crush - adopts a dog named Odie and brings him home, Garfield gets the one thing he doesn’t want. Competition.
Direction: Peter Hewitt directed this first Garfield movie, the second Bill & Ted movie, the fifth Home Alone, and, thank God, the only Zoom movie.
Screenplay: Bill Murray has famously told a story that he agreed to do this movie because it was written by Joel Cohen (and Alec Sokolow) and he didn't know that was a different person from Joel Coen of the Coen Brothers. My question is: Why does everybody believe that stupid story?
Performances: Murray is perfect in the role. His voice is what the Garfield of the comic strip sounds like in everybody's head. His live-action counterparts are a who's who of "that person was around in 2004!": Breckin Meyer, Jennifer Love Hewitt, and Stephen Tobolowsky. Everyone knows how much I love David Eigenberg (Steve would've never cheated on Miranda!), but he should've been a dog.
Computer imagery: Holds up!
Best Moment: Anytime a dog is on screen.
Fun Fact: When I was a kid, my dad wanted to camp in the backyard. That sounded terrible to me, so I convinced him to run a long extension cord from the house to power my portable DVD player and then rent this movie from Blockbuster.
Imaginary Accolade: Best Garfield Movie I've Seen This Year (also The Only Garfield Movie I've Seen This Year)
Everything is too long! Is it too long? 84 minutes is perfect.
Rating: I watched the first half of this movie with my 6th grade class and it didn't get a laugh from a single kid. I finished it at home, however, and my dog was mesmerized. He whimpered when the bad guy stole Odie. He knew what was happening!
Credit: Plot synopsis from Letterboxd via TMDb.
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