Maybe the film rubbed me the wrong way because it doesn't separate itself enough from its protagonist, a self-involved, pretentious 15-year-old, Oscar (Aaron Stanford), infatuated with his own supposed cleverness and maturity, who lusts after his stepmother (Weaver) but ends up sleeping with her best friend (Neuwirth). In the same obnoxious way as Oscar, the movie sprinkles quotes from Voltaire throughout in what's meant to be a light-hearted way but is really the filmmaker's transparently faux-casual way of announcing, "Look how smart I am." (Not as smart as you think, buddy -- Oscar doesn't even read Voltaire in the original French, though he shows off his fluency incessantly.)
Though it centers around Oscar's borderline-incestuous love, the movie is trite, predictable, and unadventurous (compare it to Spanking the Monkey, where it's the kid's real mother; nevertheless, it certainly wasn't appropriate for the under-10 kids I saw running around the theater). Oscar vehemently protests when his father (Ritter) asks him to walk a girl his own age home -- he absolutely refuses. Cut to... him walking the girl home. Wow! I never saw that coming! The movie is full of these wacky situations you normally see in a sitcom starring... well, John Ritter.
It's amateurish, too, in technique. You can make digital video look good, but apparently no one ever told director Gary Winick how. The picture quality is wretched at times, as is the sound. The camera bobs unsteadily, which gave me a headache.
Even in only 75 minutes, the multiple writers can't maintain character consistency. Would any kid over five years old, much less one as preternaturally wise as our clever Oscar, think that he could paste on fake sideburns (made of dog hair, no less) and look natural? (Even more preposterously, no one remarks on the sudden appearance of sideburns on a 15-year-old.) Neuwirth defends sleeping with the boy because it's been so long since she's been with anyone who's "excited about life." Excited about life? Please. Oscar wears his ennui ostentatiously, like a designer suit.
The only good scene in the movie is in a snooty French
restaurant, where
Oscar, Weaver, Ritter, and Neuwirth are having dinner. Neuwirth
saves
the predictable situation -- and her shallow role as the over-40 sexpot
-- with her silent, arch, merciless taunting of Oscar, threatening to
reveal
to Weaver that they slept together. She saves the scene -- but
she
can't save the movie.
Random thought (because I doubt I'll be reviewing this movie): Is it just me, or when you hear someone mention the movie K-19, is the next thought that comes into your head, "She thinks I'm crazy, but I'm just growing old"?
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