When director Lisa Cholodenko’s THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT debuted at the festival, it sparked audience enthusiasm so great it was matched only by one of Sundance’s most intense bidding wars ever. Eventually snapped up by Focus Features, KIDS went on to win Best Feature at Berlin International Film Festival’s Teddy Awards. It also topped…
THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT really stayed with me. As in, I kept thinking about the situations, hearing those characters’ voices, and seeing globs of hair in my own shower drain. (That’s not a spoiler, and hopefully inspiring the curiosity of the disgusting and weird in those who’ve not yet seen the film – only movie I know in which drain hair plays a key role.) And seeing those women, Annette Bening and Julianne Moore. What do I see? Hair on the legs on Julianne, no make up on Annette, wrinkles on both. And you know what? It’s awesome.
Perrin recently reviewed THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT, a new movie starring Annette Bening and Julianne Moore as lesbian mothers. It is the longest time I have ever spent with a lesbian couple in my entire life here on this great earth. And was rather enjoyable. Who knew?
It’s funny how movies get lumped together. Just before seeing Lisa Cholodenko’s new film THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT, I overhead a friend recommending it to his skeptical mother by saying “No, really it’s good. It’s not another GREENBERG.” Meaning, I suppose, that like GREENBERG it stars the ponderous middle-aged bourgeoisie in a film that is essentially composed of a series of conversations. Unlike GREENBERG, however, the conversations in THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT actually seem to accomplish something. And as an added bonus we aren’t stuck for a whole film with one small, angry man but with an entire nuclear family, off-balance though they may be.
THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT, an official selection of the Sundance Film Festival 2010
It’s easy to see why Lisa Cholodenko’s THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT has scored the biggest distribution deal to date at this year’s Sundance. (Focus Features acquired it for a reported $5 million.) Enthusiastically received at its packed premiere on Monday night, this lively crowd pleaser appears to take a conventional form (family dramedy) and give it an unconventional spin (it’s about what you might call a modern family).