I'm sick today, NO IT ISN'T CORONAVIRUS. I've just got some shitty cold. Or the Omicron variant. Whatever. Anyway as a result I'm pretty low on energy and my attention span is virtually non-existent. So naturally I've tried to go for a movie that requires as little effort as is physically possible to cover: Inspector Gadget. Yes that Matthew Broderick Inspector Gadget movie, infamous for being critically derided and almost universally hated amongst the film watching community, it represented a real low point in Disney's creative output and cost them an absolute mountain, a small countries' worth of cash. I have... zero... memories of watching this as a teenager because by the time I was 14 I'd moved on to movies like American Psycho and Secretary, movies that will never wind up on this blog because they are actually good but I do have some vague, pseudo memory of actually watching it at some point before now, so this isn't my first time, but it left such little impression on me, that it might as well be.
After trying to save the life's work of Dr Artemis Bradford, Security Offer, John Brown (Matthew Broderick) is horrendously maimed and injured at the hands of billionaire criminal Sanford Scolex (Rupert Everett). Pledging to finish her fathers work, Dr Brenda Bradford (Joely Fisher - who looks ridiculously stunning in this movie. My god.) decides that John is to become the first subject of the Gadget program and after a slapstick operation... literally... John Brown is reborn as the first cyber-police offer for the Riverton Police Department: the eponymous Inspector Gadget! Meanwhile, injured himself after his brush with JB, Sanford is fitted with a robotic hand and assumes the moniker Claw, "like Madonna, or Cher", and is determined to utilize Artemis Bradford's scientific work to build an army of autonomous androids. But when his own experiments yield little success he concludes that Brenda has something he doesn't... Meanwhile initial training and feeling in for Gadget is not going very well as he drowns Brenda in toothpaste, crushes a yoga teachers testicles and has a fight with his custom built car; the Gadgetmobile (voiced by D. L. Hughley) that is rudely interrupted by them actually catching some criminals. Catching the attention of Sanford, he attends an in person ball thrown to celebrate the success of the Gadget program and propositions Brenda, offering her unlimited finances and the freedom to manage her own projects in return for joining Scolex Industries and once inducting her on to the payroll, steals her data to build his own Gadget... Meanwhile the real life Gadget is getting real fed up of being under utilised and under appreciated by Riverton PD, and when his request to investigate the murder of Artemis Bradford is turned down, he takes matters into his own hands, 'borrowing the case file' and beginning to interpret it's contents. With a bit of help from his observant niece, Penny (a very young Michelle Trachtenberg) Gadget deduces that Scolex Industries was behind the murder and races over there in the Gadgetmobile. Meanwhile Imposter Gadget is going on a rampage, burning cars and... beards... which catches the attention of the news and vicariously, Brenda. But she is interrupted when the real Gadget, after... scaling... the Scolex Building with a bit of help from the go-go-gadget grappling hook, warns her about how dangerous Sanford is. Brenda, storming into his office discovers RoboBrenda - an exact robotic duplicate of her, "only prettier" who ends up unintentionally giving away that it was Sanford who stole her fathers research. Inside Scolex, Gadget locates the robotic foot, which was the product of Artemis's research and almost gets away with it until he triggers the alarm causing the security measures to activate and is captured by Sanford and his team, resulting in his control chip being removed and rendering him useless. Brenda, meanwhile is searching for Gadget, and along the way gets picked up by Penny and the Gadgetmobile where they locate Gadget at a nearby scrapyard. Imposter Gadget continues to cause mayhem throughout the town including a scene which, in retrospect is potentially a bit racially insensitive to Japanese people... but uh... back at the scrapyard; believing Gadget to be uhh... scrap Brenda and Penny are heartbroken, but when Brenda leans in and plants a kiss on Gadget, it rouses him and he slowly begins to drift back to life. Speeding away in the Gadget mobile, dropping Penny off on the way, Gadget and Brenda catch up with Sanford and Imposter Gadget in Sanford's limo where Sanford delivers the single best line in this entire movie; "God, you're irritating," whilst referring to Gadget! So funny. Initially, the apprehension of Sanford and Imposter Gadget doesn't go very well which is a great excuse for a car chase scene, and as the two Gadgets, whilst scrapping, get left behind, the Gadgetmobile and Brenda continue to pursue Sanford in his limo and when Brenda finally does catch up with him Sanford takes her hostage inside the Scolex building. Meanwhile Penny (and Brain the Beagle who has been in this movie the entire time, he just wasn't important enough to mention before now...) arrives back on the scene and pursues Sanford inside the building... Finally managing to dispatch of Imposter Gadget, and learning about the Brenda situation from the Gadgetmobile, Gadget flies to the scene using the gadget-copter and just catches up with Sanford and Brenda in time to see Sanford trying to make a get-away by helicopter. After a botched attempt at stopping the helicopter resulting on him stuck to the landing gear, Gadget uses his... pen... to launch a tiny hairpin that triggers a switch on Sanfords claw, sending the copter into a spin and freeing Brenda, just in time for Gadget to catch her and sail, almost smoothly to the ground with an umbrella. The Gadgetmobile is in just the right place to catch a falling Sanford and locks him inside just as half the Riverdale police force turn up, and, as Brenda and Gadget finally get to share a kiss, Penny explains to the Chief about the Imposter and the theft of the foot getting Gadget off the hook and our hero earns the respect of the Police force finally!
Well... I would be lying if I said I didn't find this enjoyable. And because of my cold I'm irritable and impatient at the moment, yet even so I genuinely found this enjoyable. Now don't get me wrong, this movie falls terribly, terribly flat in so many places. But there a sparks, there are glimmers of a perfectly enjoyable children's movie trying to shine through this spaghetti dinner of a film.
Let's talk about some of the good points first. Matthew Broderick, whilst slightly mis-cast in my opinion, actually does a pretty decent job as the lead. He is not a bad actor. There are moments when he does come across as a little wooden, but broadbrushly speaking he carries the lead role just fine. Similarly Joely Fisher does a really good job of being the almost-supporting lead, she's called upon to be the strong female lead character and pulls off the role really well and it's clear she puts her A-game into this movie. But the absolute stand out for me was Rupert Everett as Sanford Scolex who was an outstanding, if not slightly stereotypical, lead villain and was perfect as the slightly geeky, slightly goofy, but nefarious billionaire turned bad guy. He was so good he almost felt wasted in this movie.
A nod also to the very young Michelle Trachtenberg who was great here in a child star role and of course would go on to be more famous in other movies in the future. The acting here actually by most people involved was all above average at worst, really. Even in their supporting roles, the supporting actors gave life and character to their uhh... characters, and there wasn't a single person that really let the team down.
However this, and some honestly impressive cinematography, are about where the positives end and I felt the slapstick comedy and the nature of the humour really, really let the movie down. I'm aware that, in my mid-30's now, that I'm probably outside the recommended age demographic, but for me the humour just felt really forced, and intentionally so over-the-top in an attempt to be funny. Imagine Flubber, if you've seen it, dialled up a notch and you probably wouldn't have been far away. If they had dialled it back just a bit, and maybe gone for a more subtle tone whilst keeping the movie entertaining, I feel like this film could have done a lot better. But instead the OTT stapstick stuff just really killed any credibility the movie might have gained, each and every time it was rolled out. It got old, it got embarrassing really quickly.
Also, for a 1 hour 20 movie, it felt... short. A common problem with origin stories, like this one, is that the protagonist of the story often plays second fiddle to the establishing of the eponymous hero. And that was definitely the case here. The actual events of Sanford/Claw building his Imposter and it causing havoc only occupied about the last 40 minutes of the movie and the preceding 40 were all about Gadget coming to be and growing into the role. This isn't necessarily a bad thing I guess, it depends where your opinion lies, but it really undermines the whole... point of the movie really if the subsequent peril of the situation pales in comparison to the establishment of the hero. It feels like a shallow swimming pool.
And I think it's those 2 points that really, ultimately, torpedo the movie. It feels like Inspector Gadget had a lot of potential. You have some solid performances from Matthew Broderick, Joely Fisher and Rupert Everett, you have a whole plethora of lore to lean back on from the Gadget TV cartoon, all the financial backing in the world from Disney (even in '99) but yet it was the decision to appeal to the lowest common denominator with the jokes and the humour that absolutely eviscerated this movie's chances of becoming a cinema franchise. Oh sure, they followed up with a direct-to-TV sequel, and watch this space because I will likely cover it, but any chance of an spinning this crayon drawing as a franchise was dead on arrival. Go-go-gadget disappointment. 2 out of 5.
