A disheartening and very weak film.
What can happen when a studio like Disney decides to make a sequel to a movie that sold very well, even though it was decimated by critics and has obvious flaws? The result can be better, with the production learning from its mistakes… but in most cases, the end result manages to be even more absurd and dishonorable than the initial film. And that is precisely what happened here!
Inspector Gadget was an amazing cartoon, but it had a brief stint on Portuguese television. I remember him, and I really enjoyed seeing him, but I don't remember seeing him much longer than four or five years. Despite this, it was one of the cartoons that I was most interested in as a child. The 1999 live-action film didn't do it justice... which is not to say it was necessarily bad. It had obvious weaknesses, which were even more glaring when it came to script writing and comic material. This movie, released several years later, is proof that none of this, or almost, was taken seriously, and that Disney only wanted to make money at the expense of fans of the original cartoon.
I've read some specialized critics point out several details of this film to justify their opinion that this film manages to be more faithful to the source material. However, I reserve the right to disagree. Claiming this because the main villain has a cat again and not showing his face is, at the very least, ignoring everything else. The original cartoon was fun, had a sense of entertainment and was designed for children and young people… this movie ignores all of that. A rush-hour shopping trip two days before Christmas Eve can be more fun and exciting than this movie, and anyone who has ever been to a mall on that day knows how unnerving and frustrating that can be.
The movie is not funny, has horrible dialogues and has a terrible script. Basically, it makes Gadget an obsolete and buggy museum piece for most of the movie, and it makes him fall in love with a robot that doesn't even have a nail of humanity. The robot, of course, would be the “new generation” of police officers who would replace him, and who end up leading the manhunt after Claw escapes from prison.
The cast hardly deserves a mention here. The competent and committed Broderick gives way to an inept and tiresome French Stewart. The performance of this actor is simply amateur, and does not do the character any justice. Elaine Hendrix has very little to do. Caitlin Wachs can also complain about the same problem, although she is quite effective and competent in what little she actually does. Tony Martin brought Claw to life, and while many welcome the changes to the character, I feel like she's become more cartoonish here.
Disney invested little in the film: proof of this is the weakness of the visual effects and CGI used, which are clearly cheap and unconvincing. The film's fast pacing subtly seeks to stop audiences from thinking seriously about what they're watching, but I felt that didn't work very well for me because I felt the film was running. The sets and filming locations do their part, but the soundtrack is disappointing.