Herbie Goes Bananas

Jim Douglas has long retired and has left his car to Pete Staniczek as long as he collects it from South America. So Pete and engineer Davy Johns collect the car to enter it into a race, but they first have to contend with little pickpocket Paco. Despite the look of the car, they take it on the cruise ship with them when they leave – not knowing that Paco has sneaked onboard as well to escape the wrath of one of his victims who are part of a gang planning to steal Aztec gold.

This was supposedly the final entry in the series but I suppose that the new 2005 film means that it is number 4 of 5 (so far). The characters and locations have all changed but essentially the formula is still the same – physical comedy from Herbie, romance from the driver, a crime subplot although no race as such. In this regard it doesn't do anything particularly special or go anywhere other than you expect it to, but it is inoffensive and not annoying or boring. The comedy is so-so, with plenty of Herbie action for kids (apparently they went through over 20 cars making this) and acceptable humour for adults.

The cast are mixed – in some regards they carry the movie but in others they are terrible. The lead cast are mostly poor. Burns shows how enjoyable Jones was because he is totally lacking in charisma or screen presence. Smith does his best to impersonate the usual engineer sidekick (Knotts) by mugging and pulling faces but it never gets past the stage of impersonation to become his own work. Davalos is terribly dull, although her wooden, uninspired delivery does quite compliment Burns. Garay (the third, would you believe) is OK but if you hate "cute kids" in movies then you'll hate his squeaky little performance; however I suppose it is quite cool that the car gets to act opposite an orphan – very like Chaplin. Thank goodness for the support cast then, because they do a lot of the work that the lead actors fail to do; not saying that they are that good but at least they are lively and interesting. Korman overacts with little material to work with but he is very funny at times. Leachman is a lot more by-the-numbers and not as interesting. The criminal gang don't have much to do but the faces will be interesting for adults – Jaeckel and Rocco for example.

Overall, this is a fairly obvious entry in the series but it is still enjoyable. The overuse of the kid will put many adults off because it brings out some horrible, cloying sentiment but mostly the film is lively and quite enjoyable. Children will enjoy it and adults will be able to watch it without feeling bored.