A Family Affair movie review

MOVIE TITLE: A Family Affair

This May/December rom-com is now playing exclusively on Netflix.

RATING: PG-13

LENGTH: 1 hour 51 minutes

Movie Review Mom GRADE: C

SPONSOR of Today’s movie review: Oreos were talked about in the movie when the movie star was surprised to learn that there were so many different flavors! Below is a picture of an Oreo gift I recently received from a company. I thought it was pretty cute!

OreoiD: https://amzn.to/3zitvY7

IN A NUTSHELL:

The story is about an unexpected romance between a movie star and a writer, whose daughter just happens to work for the movie star.

The film was directed by Richard LaGravenese. This is his first movie in 10 years! Writing credits go to Carrie Solomon.

THINGS I LIKED:

The cast is terrific and includes Nicole Kidman. She’s 57 years old with legs for days. In the movie, her character says she’s 16 years older than Zac Efron, but they’re actually 20 years apart in real life. She and Zac were both previously in the movie The Paperboy together in 2012. I think they were miscast as a romantic couple in this movie, sadly.
Zac Efron plays a narcissistic movie star. Zac is hot off his movie The Iron Claw, where he turned his body into a rock-hard professional wrestler. He dug deep and gave an excellent performance in that film, which is based on a true story. There’s a moment in this movie where Zac’s character has a bunch of big, red circles on his skin. It’s from a Chinese medical treatment called cupping. I’ve been to China many times on business trips and saw a lot of people who did that. They tell me it’s extremely painful. The debate over there is whether or not it actually improves a person’s health. I was too afraid to try it, although I had a smaller, more gentle version of it done during a foot massage when I was in China.
Joey King is really great in this and stole the show. Her last project was fantastic called We Were The Lucky Ones. You should definitely check out my review of that limited series about the Holocaust. While the movie is considered a rom-com, the focus is truly on Joey King’s character in a type of coming-of-age film.
I loved Kathy Bates in this and thought she looked great, much better than in her recent movie Summer Camp. I loved seeing her be there for both her daughter and granddaughter.
When the movie star learns that his assistant’s mom is from Australia, he asks if she knows Margot Robbie, bragging that he does. Nicole Kidman actually starred in the movie Bombshell with Margot, but Zac Efron has never worked with her.
Early in the movie, Zac Efron’s and Joey King’s character listen to a Cher song in the car and start singing along. The lyrics to “Believe” give us a foreshadow of the theme of the story, which is “Do you believe in life after love?” Nicole Kidman plays a widow whose husband died 11 years prior, and being with Zac Efron’s character makes her believe in love again.
There is also a side story about two friends and how they should support one another.
The title is perfectly suited to illustrate how our chosen relationships absolutely affect our entire family. I’ve seen families struggle when one family member chooses to love someone the rest of them don’t like or think is a good match.

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE:

It would be so refreshing if beautiful actresses and handsome actors just let themselves age gracefully rather than constantly get plastic surgery, or use botox or fillers. They rarely look better. Nicole Kidman’s and Zac Efron’s faces were super distracting in this movie and prevented them from showing real emotion. To partially defend Zac, he had a jaw reconstruction after a terrible accident in real life.
Both Zac Efron and Nicole Kidman are lovely singers, so it would have been fun to hear them sing a few bars of something together. Unfortunately, they didn’t have any chemistry together.
Some of the scenarios are absolutely ridiculous.

TIPS FOR PARENTS:

Talk of a queer dramedy
We see a woman in just her underwear.
A man and woman who just met get drunk and “go at it” on a bed. They take their shirts off and then the daughter walks in on them.
We also see another unmarried couple together in bed.
We see a shirtless man.
Some profanity

THEMES:

Celebrity entitlement
Mother/Daughter relationships
Life after love
Age-gap romance
Family
Connection
Taking people for granted
Supporting others
Parenting
Friendship

FUNNY LINES:

“Oh, my gosh. Is that Bradley Cooper? No, it’s just a regular person.” – Chris Cole (Zac Efron)
“Do you always just let yourself in?” – Brooke Harwood (Nicole Kidman) “I’m famous, so yeah.” – Chris Cole (Zac Efron)
“I would hate-watch that so hard.” – Zara Ford (Joey King)
“Shave your armpits. We’re going out.” – Zara Ford (Joey King)
“That whole thing was so bad for women.” – Eugenie (Liza Koshy)

INTERESTING LINES:

“I keep wondering when my life is going to start.” – Zara Ford (Joey King)
“You are just reeking with importance, aren’t ya? She’s important. I had no idea until this moment.” – Eugenie (Liza Koshy)
“We didn’t do anything wrong. A little lying, maybe…” – Chris Cole (Zac Efron)
“What am I doing? What business do I have playing a good guy?” – Chris Cole (Zac Efron)