LOOK WHAT THE CAT DRAGGED IN

REVIEWED - GARFIELD: A RALE OF TWO KITTIES DESPITE the allusion in its unexpectedly witty title, the second film focusing on…

REVIEWED - GARFIELD: A RALE OF TWO KITTIESDESPITE the allusion in its unexpectedly witty title, the second film focusing on the adventures of the unamusing cat who has, since 1740 or so, been eating lasagne beneath Hagar the Horrible in smaller newspapers than this one owes more to Mark Twain than it does to Charles Dickens. It is not as witty or as insightful as The Prince and the Pauper. Indeed, spreading soiled cat litter over the screen would offer viewers a more rewarding vista than that offered by Tim Hill's dire role-reversal comedy. Some children will, I'm sure, find it diverting. Then again, some children find it diverting to chew through live electric cables.

Not that any of you cares, the plot sees Garfield's master following his girlfriend to London with the intention of proposing marriage. To the surprise of nobody, the orange cat and his friend, a puppy named Odie, stow away in a curiously unexamined bag before emerging to pester grenadier guards and frolic before Tower Bridge. Meanwhile, 40 miles upriver. . .

Oh for heaven's sake. Life is too short for me to relate - and you to read - the plot of Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties. Suffice to say, the hero swaps identities with a posh cat and spends the film eating caviar and evading the homicidal intentions of the aristocat's human heir apparent.

British readers eager to get themselves in a tizzy will find plenty of inaccuracies over which to fulminate. Carlisle has been relocated some 500 miles to the south. Exterior scenes feature exotic flora rarely seen outside southern California. Worst of all, we are asked to believe that Billy Connolly might pass for an English aristocrat.

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Special relationship, my eye.

Donald Clarke

Donald Clarke

Donald Clarke, a contributor to The Irish Times, is Chief Film Correspondent and a regular columnist