JNL

Movie Review: Mr. Magoo

This content of this post originally appeared in the “JNL” section of the Janesville Gazette.

Leslie Nielsen stars in this new comedy as Mr. Magoo, a near-blind character from a children’s cartoon series. He portrays the nearsighted man very well, from the squinting to his well-known laugh, “Oh ho ho, Magoo. You’ve done it again!”

The movie starts out (and ends up) as a cartoon, showing all of the mayhem that the clueless old man causes and how he always ends up without a scratch. It then moves into the live action, still using all of the same characters.

The whole idea of the movie is that Mr. Magoo is involved in a jewel heist and doesn’t know it. Along the way, he eludes the criminals. He is suspected of stealing the jewel by the police, FBI and CIA. The FBI and CIA agents try to outdo each other, resulting in some funny scenes. In trying to get the jewel back himself, Magoo impersonates a billionaire jewel-collecting gangster and a blushing bride. Magoo is assisted by his nephew, Waldo, and his faithful bulldog, Angus.

Lots of the action features people getting hit by things or people running into things, sort of like the -Home Alone” movies, which I personally do not care for. But in “Mr. Magoo,” the action is spaced out more evenly, and it looks much more realistic and some of it is stuff that actually could happen in real life. It does get a little bit overdone, which is one thing that could have been improved.

I think that people of all ages could enjoy this movie. Many adults remember the cartoon from when they were younger and would go see it for the memories; kids will like it for the jokes, action and the way the main character just barely escapes the traps. It’s a funny movie.

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