At The Movies: Antic fun in The Garfield Movie, Jeanne Du Barry a lavish soap opera

The Garfield Movie (PG)

101 minutes, opens on May 22
3 stars

The story: Before comic strip stardom, Garfield (voiced by Chris Pratt) was a cute kitten abandoned on a street corner by his alley-cat pa Vic (Samuel L. Jackson) one rainy night. A high-stakes heist precipitates a belated father-son reunion in the orange tabby’s first fully computer-animated comedy feature.

Garfield and his beagle bestie Odie (Harvey Guillen) are having a midnight kitchen snack in The Garfield Movie when abducted by a hulking Shar Pei (Brett Goldstein) and a whippet (Bowen Yang).

The interlopers are the henchmutts of villainous Persian Longhair diva Jinx (Hannah Waddingham), a former criminal associate of Vic with a score to settle. Vic must break into a dairy farm and bring her 1,672 bottles of milk within 72 hours in exchange for the hostages.

This Garfield is a long way from the comforts of home with doting owner Jon (Nicholas Hoult), far from American cartoonist Jim Davis’ creation of the fat and lazy house pet as a satire on suburban life.

Also uncharacteristic of the sourpuss are Pratt’s indifferent vocals. Bill Murray’s sarcasm in the 2004 and 2006 live-action adaptations was a better fit.

Part origin story, part espionage-style adventure, it is nevertheless antic fun with Davis as an executive producer, Mark Dindal (Chicken Little, 2005; The Emperor’s New Groove, 2000) as the director and Ving Rhames, in a bit of excellent casting, as a bull helping to plan the operation.

There are speeding trains, pizza-box drones and a witty Google Translate gag, plus a near-death escape from an industrial cheese shredder.

Adults will note the Fargo (1996) spoof, among other cinema references. And this would not be a Garfield movie without a lasagna to heal family rifts.

Hot take: The funniest Mission: Impossible episode Rhames has ever been in.

Jeanne Du Barry (NC16)

117 minutes, opens on May 23
3 stars

The story: Based on the affair that scandalised 18th-century France, French actress Maiwenn gets poufed and primped as the titular courtesan born Jeanne Vaubernier, who ascended aristocratic society to become the favoured mistress of King Louis XV (Johnny Depp).

The French historical drama is disgraced Hollywood idol Depp’s first feature after five years of legal disputes with his former wife, American actress Amber Heard, over allegations of domestic violence.

The Cannes Film Festival came under fire in 2023 for opening with his movie, and yet, it is not his tabloid notoriety that ultimately upstages the biopic’s subject, but star and writer-director Maiwenn.

The rags-to-royalty story of a lowly prostitute exploiting her wits and seductiveness to escape her circumstances is now a self-infatuated vanity project where Maiwenn-as-Jeanne is a modern beauty, reading racy literature, cavorting with her Bengali slave boy (Djibril Djimo) and giggling at imperial pomp.

Her irreverence captivates Depp’s bored, bewigged sovereign. They make funny faces at each other.

Depp still has flashes of his impish charm, and Maiwenn, so obtrusive on-screen, is at her best as a film-maker pointing out the absurdities and also the pettiness of palace life.

Jeanne’s enemies are many. The king’s daughters (India Hair, Suzanne de Baecque and Capucine Valmary) and teen dauphine Marie Antoinette (Pauline Pollmann) scheme especially to depose her.

The opulent spectacle filmed on location in the Palace of Versailles, with wardrobe courtesy of Chanel, has entertainment value for sure – if not depth, complexity nor romantic passion, much less the real Jeanne.

Hot take: Despite the eponymous title, this biographical period piece is less character study than lavish soap opera.