Inspector Gadget

Disney's live-action rendition of the animated TV series starts encouragingly enough, in cartoon style - replete with jerky camera movements - in which geeky security guard John Brown (Broderick) apprehends a baddie. The arrest goes awry, however, and John finds himself strung up in a hospital bed - the perfect candidate, thinks Government scientist Dr Brenda Bradford (Fisher), on whom to try out a wacky new experiment. Unaware of her intentions, the helpless John has every conceivable crime-fighting gizmo grafted to his body; days later, sporting a Bogart-like grin, he stumbles out of hospital as the Government's new one-man police force, a veritable Swiss Army Knife on legs. It's roughly at this point (about 10 minutes in) that the film goes horribly pear shaped. The plot jackknifes as soon as Everett enters the fray as the obligatory English baddie, with a grand scheme to build a rogue clone of the inspector.