You might find it odd that I'm reviewing this film now, when it came out last year. Truth is I have no idea why I didn't see it when it was released as I fully intended to. I started this blog with the intention to review all of the films I see at the cinema this year, therefore, however late I may have been in seeing The Kids Are Alright, it has to be included in this compilation.
The film is about a family consisting of two mums and two kids. The mums are a married lesbian couple who have each had one child using the same sperm donor. So the kids are half sister and brother. Following so far? We join them when the kids, aged 18 and 15, decide they want to meet their biological father. Joni (Mia Wasikowska) is 18, the daughter of Nic (Annette Bening) and about to head off for college. She's asked by her brother Laser (Josh Hutcherson), who is the son of Nic's wife Jules (Julianne Moore) and only 15, if she will make a call to the sperm bank where their mums obtained sperm donated by then 19 year old Paul (Mark Ruffalo). Paul, now late 30's, agrees to meet with the kids. Although the first meeting is awkward, it sparks a curiosity in all three to meet again and get to know each other better. However, as the first meeting happens without the knowledge of the mums, it comes as something of a shock for them to discover that their kids have not only contacted, but met up with a man neither of them know. The mums therefore decide that they must also get to know Paul and this is where the family drama's come in.
I have to admit that I was left somewhat confused by The Kids Are Alright. First, although I thought the actors gave their all, and each of them had at least one strong scene, I have no idea how this film has won and been nominated for so many awards. Second, I found the early sex scenes in the film totally unnecessary. You might think this strange coming from the girl who has mentioned in several unrelated reviews how much I loved Love and Other Drugs, but hear me out. I didn't feel like either of the early sex scenes aided the story in any way. In fact, I think you could have cut both scenes completely and lost nothing in the way of plot. And before you go thinking I'm some sort of gay sex prude, I will state for the record that I thought the lesbian sex scene in Black Swan was one of the best portrayed, most realistic and sexiest gay sex scenes I have seen. Not that I'm an expert obviously.
Unnecessary sex aside, I also felt like the film was trying too hard to be funny. Sometimes with cringe worthy results. During the lesbian sex scene it emerges that they watch male gay porn in order to get aroused. This is mentioned later when Laser finds the porn and asks them why they watch it, being that they're lesbians and all. I have to say that I'm glad he did because I was dying to know. I don't know that many lesbians, but of the ones I do know I'm 99.9% sure they don't watch guys going at it to get turned on. At this point the writer obviously thought it'd be funny to point out that straight women often play lesbians in films and it's very unrealistic. That might have been a great joke if she'd spent any time making Bening and Moore into a believable lesbian couple. But for me personally, I didn't think they were. And I don't think the lack of sexual chemistry between them was helped by the terrible sex scene inflicted upon them.
I genuinely enjoyed a lot of the nicer moments of the film. Although it was obvious that Jules and Paul were going to start an affair, I enjoyed watching their relationship blossom. I similarly enjoyed seeing Paul's relationships change with each of the kids. I liked that he became more dad-like with them and their response to that side of him. I loved the scene at the dinner table with Annette Bening's moving rendition of Joni Mitchell's Blue, but I felt it was somewhat sullied by the scene that followed. The moments I enjoyed made me long for more, as this was when I was really beginning to like the characters and starting to see them less like a bunch of stereotypes who'd all been stuck in a movie together, hippy dad who was absent when the kids were growing up, the repressed and unappreciated mum who starts an affair, the borderline alcoholic mum who's too tightly wound to notice her wife's impending affair, the daughter who's trying to break out of mums grasp by rebelling etc. We've seen all of these characters before, in other, better movies. What makes these tired characters interesting is the change they undergo during the film, the lessons they learn. The problem here is that they don't change, or learn, they end the film exactly how they started.
My final *minor* criticism is that while I fully believe that the free spirited Jules would name her son Laser, I don't think her straight laced wife would have ever allowed her to go through with that. Yet again putting this movie firmly in the unrealistic category. I'm sorry to say that while the kids may have been alright, the film wasn't. 4.5 out of 10.
Viewing Date - 9th February 2011
UK Release Date - 29th October 2010
Cast Overview:
Annette Bening ~ Nic
Julianne Moore ~ Jules
Mark Ruffalo ~ Paul
Mia Wasikowska ~ Joni
Josh Hutcherson ~ Laser
Director/Writer ~ Lisa Cholodenko
Writer ~ Stuart Blumberg
Director/Writer ~ Lisa Cholodenko
Writer ~ Stuart Blumberg
When I first saw this film advertised I thought it looked godawful. Then it started winning things and people started to talk about it. I revised my summary dismissal and put it on my 'must get round to watching it list' - your review has made me reconsider my, err, reconsidering. I've sat through more than enough awful lesbian films already simply because they had lesbians in, I don't think I can take another one. Thanks!
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