Parental Guidance (2012)

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Parental Guidance (2012)

5/10

Starring

Billy Crystal

Bette Midler

Marisa Tomei

Directed by Andy Fickman

Parental Guidance can be seen as a sit down family movie on a beautiful Saturday morning or a struggling sitcom trying to get off a Friday time-slot, don’t go rushing to the cinema expecting a masterpiece just be patient for the DVD release. The movie is predictable, sloppy and at times out right outrageous to be taken seriously. Parental Guidance suffers also from lack of creativity, as some scenes and elements can be said to be taken from other family oriented movies like Cheaper by the Dozen (2003), which from my opinion is just lame.

The movie is directed by Race to Witch Mountain (2009) director Andy Fickman, and it stars Billy Crystal and Bette Midler. (who were the only reason I got up to go see the movie, and due to the box office performance of the movie I guess some people also fell for it, thinking their presence was a recipe for a good movie) Both Crystal and Midler play married grandparents who are called upon to babysit their grandkids for some days. Ironically, you will expect Marisa Tomei who plays Crystal and Midler’s daughter to shine along with the two classic actors, but she fell short.

The movie plot is as I said is about two grandparents called upon by their daughter Alice (Marisa Tomei), to come babysit her kids as she and her husband plan a getaway together. Artie and Diane (Crystal and Midler) show up to find out their grandkids are raised in the most awkward way, as their parents practically allow them to do what they want, never saying no to them or correcting them.

Diane (Midler) wants to connect with her grandkids as she and Artie seem to be left out of their grandkids life, so she begs Artie to be at his best, but Artie who was still chasing a dream selfishly ignores Diane’s warning and almost wrecked what was left of the family bond.

As far as acting go, Crystal and Midler were head and shoulders above everybody else, they were a fun couple and wonderful to see on screen, they did their portrayal pretty well enough, but their others counterparts in the movie were just below standard.

Parental Guidance had a bad rating from critics, holding a 19% rating on Rotten Tomatoes although 66% of audience enjoyed it, I enjoyed seeing Billy Crystal and Bette Midler but that is not a good enough reason for me to suggest to anyone to go watch this movie, but as I said wait for the DVD release and have fun watching it together with your family, because for me this movie should have been a TV movie or a B movie.