Zara (Zoe King) is already having problems with her boss, arrogant Hollywood star Chris Cole (Zac Efron) – but things get more complicated when her widowed mother (Nicole Kidman) falls in love with him and the couple gets serious.
Remember the 2012 movie The Paperboy? In the blockbuster film directed by Lee Daniels, Nicole Kidman and Zac Efron came together on screen in a sexy, sweaty affair that tripled worldwide air conditioner sales. 12 years later, their romantic encounter in A Family Affair is much more tepid. As anyone with eyes can attest, Kidman and Efron are just as hot now as they were then, and they still share a lot of chemistry this time around. In fact, that’s one of the few reasons anyone would recommend this latest romantic comedy from director Richard LaGravenese.
But the problem is that A Family Affair isn’t just a romantic comedy. It’s also a coming-of-age story for Zara (Zoe King), a middle-aged coming-of-age story for her mother Brooke (Kidman), and a sex slapstick comedy for Chris (Ephron). Chris says his first date with Brooke feels like “nine dates in one,” and Carrie Solomon’s first script is jam-packed, so it lacks the nuance to effectively address any of these individual ideas. Throw in some lackluster criticisms of celebrities and Hollywood, and what you’re left with is messier than the actual family it depicts. Criticizing Hollywood’s generic screenwriting in a film like this is particularly short-sighted.
But it’s not all bad. King has enough charm to pull us through the path of an often unlikable character, while the warmth between Kidman and Kathy Bates (who plays Brooke’s mother-in-law) is wonderful and heartfelt. One scene they share in particular is so good that it feels like it belongs in another movie. It’s hard to imagine the film’s original title, “Motherfucker,” working in moments like these, though it’s unfortunate that the end result lacks the vibrant energy that this title so desperately needs, especially in the realm of humor. You know there’s a problem when Chris’s “Die Hard meets Miracle on 34th Street,” or its horror of invisible zombies turning your brain into kelp, looks better than the actual movie you’re watching.
Not even Nicole Kidman playing Kathy Bates — or Zac Efron singing Cher’s Believe — is enough to rescue what should have been a surefire hit from Hallmark musings and tired clichés.
