I don't think there has been a worse film to come around like this since Ski Patrol. I wanted to like it (Matthew Broderick is one of my favorite actors of the 90's), but he is undermined by effects (some good, some pointless) and a Rupert Everett claw man. Only one part of this film is remotely watchable, that is the end where there is a seminar for bad guys including the metal mouth from the James Bond films and Mr. T. I reccomend that part to movie buffs, but thats it. If you are really interested though, just watch the cartoon version, which is at least reccomended for kids. Among the worst of the year (unfortunately). D+
Add a Review
-
Quinoa198414 May 2000
-
Rattrap00720 August 2001I grew up watching the old Inspector Gadget cartoon as a kid. It was like Get Smart for kids. Bumbling boob can't solve any case and all the work is done by the walking talking dog Brain and his niece Penny. I had heard the live action movie was decent so I checked it out at the library. I rented this movie for free and felt I should have been paid to see this.
Broderick comes nowhere near the caliber of acting Don Adams had as the voice of gadget. His voice was all wrong. The girl who played Penny looked nothing like the cartoon Penny. She is brunette where the cartoon version was blonde with pigtails. But she does do a decent job given what she had to work with. Dabney Coleman gives a good performance as Cheif Quimby. Saldy he never hid in any odd place or had exploding messages tossed at him accidently by Gadget.
The gadget mobile was wrong. It never talked in the series and it did fine. Why did they do this?
Gadget was too intelligent in this film. In the show he was a complete idiot. Here he had a halfway decent intellect. It would have worked better if he was a moron.
Also the completely butchered the catchphrase. Borderick says "Wowser". It is and should always be "Wowsers". It sounds lame with out the 's'. I got upset when they showed the previews and they didn't have the correct phrase.
The ONLY decent gags were during the credits. The lacky for Claw is in front of a support group for recovering henchmen/sidekicks. Seated in the audience is Mr. T, Richard Keil aka Jaws of Bond movie fame, a Herve Villacheze look alike, Oddjob, Kato and more. This is about the only part I laughed at.
The other is at the end where Penny is checking out here gadget watch and tells brain to say somethin. Don Adams voices the dog saying that "Brain isn't in right now. Please leave your name at the sound of the woof. Woof." of course this isn't laugh out loud funny, just a nice piece of nostalgia to hear Adams in the movie. He should have at least voiced the stupid car.
Kids will like this, anyone over 13 won't. -
First of all, I absolutely love the cartoon, it is a classic, and great fun for adults and kids alike. Unfortunately, while there are some redeeming qualities, Inspector Gadget, came across for me as dull, uninspired and disappointing. But it is not the worst movie ever, I did think Disaster Movie and Home Alone 4 were much worse.
There are some bright spots. One is the special effects, they were very very good and the best part of the movie. It is true that the film is a tad low on laughs, though the part when the thumb turns itself into a cigarette lighter does raise a chuckle or two. There are some terrific scenes involving Gadget's robot self, a car chase and a helicopter. And Joely Fisher is lovely as Brenda, and Rupert Everett, ever reliable, makes an entertaining Doctor Claw.
Unfortunately, that's where the positives end. I am in complete agreement with anyone who thinks that it could've been so much better. Matthew Broderick struggles to make a convincing enough title character, but I do think it is to do with the fact that the role of Inspector Gadget is badly underwritten. Having said that, the script is very weak, and lacks any sense of plot and drive, and the plot is rather slow moving and doesn't make much sense. Plus the editing was rather choppy.
Overall, a disappointing film, that could've been so much better. Had it been more faithful to the show, and had more of a sense of fun, it could have been a great film rather than a mediocre one. 4/10 for trying. Bethany Cox -
I grew up watching Inspector Gadget. It was, and still is, one of my favorite cartoons, if not my absolute favorite. I learned a lot of geography and history from the spin-off Inspector Gadget's Field Trip. I wanted to slip on a banana peel and become the greatest detective ever.
But the film has ruined the reputation of the wonderful cartoon.
Matthew Broderick, an actor with potential, was definitely NOT the role for Inspector Gadget. First thing- in the film, Inspector Gadget is smart. Not so in the cartoon. In the film, Gadget solves the mystery mostly by himself. In the cartoon, it was almost always Penny, Brain, and the awesome book (I still want her book!). If Gadget solved the mystery, it was by accident. Gadget in the film seems to be a competent detective, but in the cartoon was pretty dumb, which was where the humor came from.
Another thing is that it's too much "Good Guy v. Bad Guy" in the film. It's not just meant to be a silly Saturday morning cartoon. Also, Gadget never should have a love story, but Disney Corporation is filled with idiots.
Also I miss the true gadgets that Gadget had, and especially the Gadget car. In the movie it was a chic convertible. In the cartoon it was a sedan police car and could turn into a van. It also barely had any gadgets and was mainly there to get him from place to place.
But if anything, the one thing that was terrible about the movie was that it was a feature movie. Inspector Gadget was a silly Saturday morning cartoon. The movie was too serious, too overdone, had too much of a plot and wasn't even remotely as funny.
Tip for those who haven't seen it: NEVER see it. EVER. Watch the cartoon, it's a true classic. -
geatornez8215 August 2010In between 1987 and 1990 (in between the ages of 5 and 8), "Inspector Gadget" was one TV show I couldn't miss. It was a crucial show to my childhood. I was actually pretty open-minded when I saw the trailers and commercials and stuff for the movie. When I found out it was going to premiere on the Starz channel, I sat and watched, for about 15 to 20 minutes. Then I got up, left, and came back in time to see the ending credits. I was just dumbfounded. There were SO MANY things WRONG with this movie:
1. Chief Quimby. In the cartoon, he would give Gadget his assignment, usually by popping up in the most bizarre of places (akin to "Get Smart's" Agent 13). Once Gadget got his assignment, he'd toss the paper back to the chief. Of course, EVERY assignment ended with "This Message Will Self Destruct," and when Gadget tossed the paper back at Quimby, KA-BLAM!!!! Usually when the assignment blew up in the chief's face, he'd lose it. And that was about the only time you'd see Quimby lose it in the cartoon. In the movie, the chief was more uptight, and very bitter, and I think there were times where he HATED Gadget! By the end of the episode of the original cartoon, he would always praise Gadget for a job well done (not realizing it had been Penny and Brain that did the legwork).
2. Matthew Broderick is definitely not a believable Gadget. Gadget is supposed to be a bumbling fool, and incompetent. Broderick's portrayal kind of made him a little smarter than usual, but not very bumbling.
3. Inspector Gadget Meets Knight Rider! Seriously, they turned the Gadget Mobile into a car that talked. Like KITT on "Knight Rider." In the original cartoon, IT NEVER TALKED!!!! Was that trip REALLY necessary?
4. Penny and Brain, or rather lack thereof. They're my favorite characters from the original show, and the fact that they were barely in this ticked me off big time. That, and Penny in the cartoon is a 10/11 year old blond girl in pigtails. In the movie, she's a brunette tween. I seem to remember at one point she was using the Top Secret Gadget phone to take a personal call from a friend. Penny and Brain are the ones who are supposed to solve the case. Such was not the situation in this movie.
5. I didn't like Gadget's love interest in this for some reason. I don't know why, she just rubbed me the wrong way.
6. This last one was the biggest, and the thing that REALLY ground my gears over this movie. Why, why, WHY did they cast Rupert Everett as Dr. Claw?! And what was with the name "Claw?" It was always DOCTOR CLAW in the cartoon! Everett looked too young to be Dr. Claw, and above all: they showed his face throughout the whole picture! That is just wrong! You're NOT supposed to SEE Dr. Claw's face, people!!!!!
Seriously, this movie made me wonder something: Did they even WATCH the original cartoon before they made this? -
Once again, Disney manages to make a children's movie which totally ignores its background. About the only thing common with this and the original Gadget cartoons is the names. The most glaring errors are the characters - Penny does not have her book, Brain has been reduced from a character to a fancy prop, Dr Claw is more a show-off than an evil villain, etc. but there are more than that. The horrors start from the first minutes of the film - having Gadget as a security guard called John Brown doesn't help identifying him as the classic Inspector Gadget. And right in the beginning we see Disney's blatant attempt to turn every story ever into a love affair between a man and a woman - they introduce Brenda, who only serves to make this movie Disney-compatible. Add to this the fact that the "Claw" seen in this film and the classic Dr Claw are almost diagonally opposite and you'll see this is going to be nowhere near the original storyline. What would help would be a better storyline to replace it - but as you guessed, Disney failed in that too. The whole movie is just Gadget acting silly for silliness's sake and lusting after Brenda. As if to add insult to the injury, Disney introduced the "new" Gadgetmobile - it doesn't look, function or think like the old Gadgetmobile at all, it's just the canonical "comic relief" figure. Disney obviously recognised that the Gadget cartoons were a comedy, so they made the film a comedy too, but they took out all the clever running gags (like the assignment paper exploding in the Chief's face) and replaced them with Gadget being a moron, the Gadgetmobile being a wise-ass, and "Claw" showing off. Someone should tell Disney that "children's movie" doesn't imply "total lack of any brain usage". Gadget should be targeted for children of 10-12 years... not children of 10-12 months like this movie. Whatever this movie is supposed to be, it is NOT, repeat NOT, the real Inspector Gadget. Because I love the old Gadget, I hate this.
-
Buddy-519 March 2000Children and adults alike are decidedly ill served by "Inspector Gadget," a frenetic but genuinely mirthless live action take on the popular Saturday morning cartoon series that mires poor Matthew Broderick in the role of a nerdish do-gooder who gets the chance to live out his heroic fantasies when he is converted into a one-man, self-contained crime fighting cybernetic arsenal.
Thanks to current state-of-the-art special effects, the filmmakers manage to effectively translate the cartoonish aspects of the original to the live action format. Despite a few glaringly bad shots utilizing rear screen projection, the visuals that help to realize the infinite gadgets at the inspector's disposal are genuinely jaw-dropping.
What the movie makers couldn't (or, at least, wouldn't) come up with is a decent script - without which all the greatest special effects in the world cannot a quality film make. Gadget is surrounded by a gallery of dull, poorly written caricatures ranging from a giddy, self-absorbed mayor, to a gruff, shortsighted chief of police, and an effete mad scientist bent on creating an army of indestructible gadget warriors, with which, of course, he (ho hum) plans to rule the world. Even the newly "hipified" gadget mobile comes across as a charmless, grating irritant as he provides a constant stream of witless one-liners as running commentary to the action.
Of the actors, Broderick and Rupert Everett cannot be faulted since both provide a degree of enthusiasm wholly unwarranted by the inferior screenplay with which they are saddled. For a perfect marriage of sophisticated writing and unsurpassable special effects, check out "Toy Story 2." And see what "Inspector Gadget" might indeed have been. -
connick-23 January 2000I was a huge fan of the original cartoon series, and was looking forward to finally seeing Gadget on the big screen -- but I never in my wildest dreams expected something so extremely extremely terrible. The pace was WAY too fast, there was no plot, and 'wowser!' - what the hell is that?? It was 'WOWSERS!!'.
-
Asteri-Atypical1 September 2001I used to have a fascination with the cartoon back in college when it was being made. It had much the charm of "Get Smart". While it admittedly had its faults, it was rather enjoyable.
Naturally I was very interested in seeing the film version. That was before I saw it. Afterwords I wished it had never been made.
Besides being miscast all around (who on Earth though Broderick was even close to the role?) it just didn't make the grade.
The effects were reasonable and perhaps the ONLY thing I liked about the movie; seeing a live-action version of the gadgets in action! What was missing was a story and treatment which made it funny or charming or interesting.
The original was a wacky cartoon with a very lighthearted attitude. It was FUN. The motion picture became murky and took itself FAR too seriously. If it had seriously had a great plot or went crazy enough to make it seem like a "cartoon on film" it might have been enjoyable.
As it exists it doesn't deserve to be considered part of the "Gadget Legacy". -
Hollywood_Yoda20 September 2018Sure, it's not a top rate film directed by Spielberg, but it's a formula family film from Disney, so it's gonna be chastised. Matthew Broderick probably wasn't the best choice for Inspector Gadget, however he was better than French Stewart.
The best part of the film was D.L. Hughley as the voice of the Gadgetmobile. And Rupert Everett was not so bad as Claw. However, the story wasn't so great, nor was the writing. But again it is a formula Disney film, so you know what you're getting into beforehand. -
jane-4227 May 2001Well. Where to begin. Let's just say this; avoid this movie at all
costs. It's based on a cartoon series. The movie makes the cartoon look
like Hamlet. Filled with emasculated actors who seem embarrassed to be
here, lousy camera work, terrible music, and enough product placement to
make you want to never visit Yahoo! again, this movie is really the
bottom of the barrel. To quote the New Yorker, Matthew Broderick and
Rupert Everett mug their way through this picture with the gay abandon
of men who have spotted a rare species of paycheck in the distance."
They should pay us some of the millions they earned for watching it.
Awful. -
tonyhic2 June 2002Having heard a lot of bad reviews about this film, I expected it to be yet another disappointing attempt to transfer a good TV show to film. What's more, i was never much of a fan of the original TV show.
I am, however, a big fan of Matthew Broderick and Rupert Everett, and they don't disappoint in the slightest. Both ham it up beautifully, and make the most of this film.
The script is far from innovative, but it does have some very clever jokes. There are a few moments of smarmy "use your heart" dialogue, but, they're thankfully kept to a minimum, and outnumbered by some more subversive lines. -
doctortardis216 April 2009i watched the original cartoon series as a kid and i can say that i loved it. when i first heard that the movie was being made, i got hyped. when i saw the movie i thought it was a master piece, but then i got it on tape and started comparing to the series,and my love for the movie slowly decreased, but i still liked it. the acting was fair, and the comedy OK, but my main problem was loyalty to the series. i liked for a while as a kid....
but seeing it many years later, makes me feel a little awkward.
but still it was an OK movie, they could have been a little more loyal to the series, but i still think it was worth watching once.
PS. compare this one to the SEQUEL, THEN YOU WILL KNOW TRUE SUCKAGE !!! -
tom_mewer11 November 2004Film: Gadget's real name is John Brown.
Cartoon: His name really is Gadget. --- Film: Claw's real name is Sanford Scolex.
Cartoon: His name really is Claw. --- Film: Metro City is in the USA.
Cartoon: Metro City is in Canada. --- Film: Gadget works for the local police department.
Cartoon: Gadget works for Interpol. --- Film: Gadget used to be a security guard and was injured in an explosion.
Cartoon: Gadget used to be a policeman and was injured when he slipped on a banana peel. --- Film: Claw's face is shown (and it looks nothing like the action figure).
Cartoon: Claw's face is never shown. --- Film: Claw has a mechanical claw inplace of one of his hands.
Cartoon: Claw has normal hands. --- Film: Quimby hates Gadget for no reason.
Cartoon: Quimby thinks Gadget is one of Interpol's best inspectors. --- Film: The Gadget Mobile can talk and has many gadgets.
Cartoon: The Gadget Mobile can't talk, can change from a police car to a van (and vice versa) and has only a few gadgets. --- Film: Gadget was put back together by a team of surgeons.
Cartoon: Gadget was put back together by one man; Professor Baxter. --- Film: Claw is the head of Scolex Industries.
Cartoon: Claw is the head of a criminal organization called MAD. --- Film: Claw has two minions.
Cartoon: Claw has hundreds of minions. --- Film: Gadget has 60 gadgets.
Cartoon: Gadget has 14,000 gadgets. -
TBJCSKCNRRQTreviews15 October 2005Well, here it is... the Inspector Gadget film. The TV-show-made-movie. The live-action version of an almost 20 year old animated series. The complete and utter disaster of a film. While this film may be somewhat entertaining to kids under the age of 7(and even that is a stretch), it's terribly insulting to anyone older than that. The plot is contrived and stupid beyond belief. The pacing is non-existent. The acting is either over- or underdone. The characters are paper-thin stereotypes. The tone is childish. The humor is incredibly poor. The whole film is so obviously directed at kids, no one else could find it even tolerable. It's so... Disney. All the way through it. A character even points out that "this is a Disney movie". In case anyone was wondering. Just to make sure we know where to direct our anger. Wouldn't want any undeserving poor sap(s) to be blamed for this mess. I could barely, with enormous amounts of effort, concentrate on watching a few seconds in a row of this film... after which I had to turn away, out of fear it might rot my brain or at the very least diminish its capacity to keep watching. It's almost physically painful to look at this film. I read that this film was cut down to 78 minutes... from 110. I can't help but wonder; if they knew it was so bad, why did they leave any film at all? I'd have destroyed all master tapes, personally. One to be approached with caution and an appropriate amount of childishness. Otherwise, it's fair to assume you won't make it out of the viewing with your sanity. I recommend this only to children and the most overbearing parents of such. Everyone else should avoid. 1/10
-
dgs6 December 1999The 80s cartoon series is given a god-awful big screen live-action treatment with Broderick as a heroic security guard badly injured that a scientist gives him a new body (RoboCop anyone?) - a machine that shoots out a variety of gadgets so he can fight a villain named Claw who has stolen a computer generated foot....whatever. Broderick is an unconvincing Inspector Gadget, Everett shows a different side of him which we don't want to see (Claw really should have been masked) and that nasty little Tratchenberg should have been replaced with Kirsten Dunst or someone BETTER...Miscasts, hideous performances, lack of humor and an atrocious screenplay just kills this incoherent, irritating and mind-numbingly awful film that provides plenty of product placements. It's hard to believe that this one made $90 million...and only lasted 78 minutes!
-
Johnny-the-Film-Sentinel-218730 November 2012Inspector Gadget sucks so hard I don't even know where to begin. For starters, this movie is ONLY meant for VERY YOUNG kids. Even if that is so, they would probably have a hard time enjoying the visuals. This is one of the ugliest family movies ever made. The humour is humourless and dry, the acting is just bad, and for a kids movie, it sure is pretty dark. Disney screwed up big time with this soulless movie. Matthew Broderick was cast as the most annoying character possible: the title character himself. His character gets "fixed" after an accident; he is turned into a robot (at the beginning of the movie), or a cyborg, or something that we couldn't possibly care about.
Also another thing in the movie is that Dr. Claw, the villain in the original Inspector Gadget TV show who never reveals his face, is clearly visible on screen most of the time, and he's just an ordinary looking guy. Nothing works in this movie. The show was never owned by Disney in the first place, but they bought the film rights to the show and lowered the show to Disney- fied levels. I never watched the show growing up, but I have seen some episodes and they were a lot better than the movie, even though the episodes were pretty standard.
Avoid this piece of rubbish at all costs. It isn't worth your time or money. It deserves to rot away and be forgotten. -
uruseiranma1 July 2006During the 1990's in Hollywood, a funny thing happened. Studios began to suddenly think that by re-imagining previous cartoons as live-action films, they could stand to make a tidy little profit. The Walt Disney Studios got off to quite a huge start when their 1996 starring vehicle 'George of the Jungle' (taken from the cartoon of the same name by legendary creator Jay Ward) made upwards of $100 million. Suddenly, a new trend had caught on. But not wanting to stop there, Disney thought they'd try again. Though this time, with a hot cartoon property from the 1980's, dubbed 'Inspector Gadget.'
The previews touted a fun, rollicking film, where Gadget would be a live-action crime-fighting 'tool,' complete with Gadgetcopter, extendo-legs, and much more. But aside from all the cool, techno-gadgetry, the film became the stuff of typical executive schlock. The town where our characters reside is colored so garish that you'd assume color-blind monkeys did the decorating work. What's more, most of the plot devices that made the cartoon series memorable have been jettisoned in favor of a jive-talking Gadgetmobile with trademark-friendly sponsors, pop-up-video-style memory flashbacks, and more.
What made the cartoon series work so well, was we never did learn most of the big questions, like 'how did Gadget get his gadgets?' 'Why does Dr Claw hate Inspector Gadget?' And even the most important one: 'what does Claw look like?'
For this film, those questions are answered for us, and it gets to the point where you just want them not to tell you these things.
'Inspector Gadget' is a throwaway summer film, as well as a mindless babysitter for when you need to do your laundry.
what Disney Studios crafted here was something so brainless that parents most likely got bored while their children were held in place with cheap live-action gags and the usual round of fart and poop jokes. -
jboothmillard15 March 2005This is one of only a few Walt Disney Pictures failures I know. It is a good idea but a bad story, bad acting and corny parts. Matthew Broderick as Inspector Gadget is too light, it might of been better if they got someone who was a bit more determined and actually knew what they were getting into. Rupert Everett as Dr. Claw is stupid as well, he hardly does anything but be an idiot with a claw on his wrist. Also starring Joely Fisher as Dr. Brenda Bradford/Robo Brenda, Beautiful Ohio and Buffy the Vampire Slayer's Michelle Trachtenberg as Penny, Andy Dick as Kramer, Scary Movie's Cheri Oteri as Mayor Wilson, Mr. T and Richard Kiel as Jaws, Famous Guy with Metal Teeth. The main reason why this is so rubbish is because although it's based on a cartoon, the cartoonish effects are too stupid. The scenes with Gadget Mobile are particularly annoying. Poor!
-
polenta31 December 2002Good funny movie for the family. I enjoyed it! Michelle Trachenberg was good in it. She however is not in the 2nd film being released on 2003. I can't wait to see the 2nd one. The 2nd one is rated G also, so that one is probably better for younger kids. I recommend this movie if you like funny comedys with silly actions.
-
whitefalcon795 March 2005Webster's dictionary defines the word travesty as, "a crude, distorted, or ridiculous representation (of something)." You couldn't sum up this truly awful movie any better.
I grew up watching the Inspector Gadget cartoon series in the 80s and sat down to watch this with my kids one night thinking it can't be that bad, right? For the next hour and a half, I watched the producers of this movie completely rape the original before beating it unconscious and leaving its remains lying in the gutter.
I'm not even going to bother listing the number of things that were wrong with this movie, the number of details they got wrong, the number of times I pointed at the TV and said "that's not how I remember it." It might have been slightly less gut-wrenching if they just gave it a new title and didn't pretend to base it on something the script-writers obviously never actually watched.
And to top it off, it starred the hilariously unfunny Matthew Broderick, who has been grating my last nerve ever since he played Ferris Bueller (and for some reason, I'm still the only person I know who hates that movie).
This was 90 minutes of my life I'll never get back and yet another example of just how low Disney can stoop. Avoid this travesty at all costs. -
servofan1 August 1999This is a great treat for Inspector Gadget fans. Matthew Broderick makes a terrific Gadget. Michelle Trachtenberg does Penny justice, and they haven't updated her at all. She's just a very smart, cute little girl. There's no annoying concessions to the nineties. Brain doesn't talk--almost, but they've picked a very cunning-looking, adorable beagle for the part. Rupert Everett is suitably evil as Dr. Claw, and Joely Fisher portrays a believable love interest. The script honors the cartoon, and the gadgetry, most inventions from the source material, do not usurp the story or characterization which nicely portrays our heroes as simply nice people you'd love to have for your neighbors. Stay in your seat until the screen goes blank. Go-Go-Great!
-
kmurphy21 July 1999When I first heard that there was going to be an Inspector Gadget movie, I cringed. And Matthew Broderick as Inspector Gadget?! The horror!
Then I saw the preview, and I was amazed at the special effects. Better than Star Wars Episode 1 in some places.
The movie itself is really for kids, but the jokes and special effects will endear themselves to adults as well. Broderick does a good job as Gadget, and I was surprised to see Andy Dick in a kids movie. -
parad1gm18 December 1999This movie was probably the worst piece of drivel I've ever seen, I want my two hours back. This movie is only fit to torture prisoners of war, and then only the ones that kill babies or rape schoolchildren. Matthew Broderick's mother said "I have no Ferris"