BY MIKEY MIGO
I tend to read a lot of year in review lists and I enjoy award season. I make a habit of watching as many of the nominated movies as possible and sometimes I try to get a head start on ones that seem to pop up a lot in those lists I was just talking about. One movie that kept popping up on people’s lists was The Kids Are All Right. I saw a few sentences of reviews and read the synopsis on imdb, but I didn’t know what I was getting into. I hadn’t even seen as much as a trailer for it, so it was definitely a blind entry mission. I knew it was about two lesbians, their kids, and the sperm donor. That, and it was supposed to be really good. It was… sorta. Annette Bening and Julianne Moore play a couple. They have kids who are older, a girl who is 18 and a boy who is like 15. The girl just turns 18 and her brother wants her to contact the sperm bank and seek information. She does him the favor and they meet him, Mark Ruffalo. The worlds of everyone collide and drama and insanity ensues. It’s a pretty unique concept and it’s damn well done. The direction of Lisa Cholodenko is beautifully done, the tone is sharp, and the casting is great. The kids, Josh Hutcherson and Mia Wasikowska are so non-stereotypical anything that their characters are kind of boring. They felt like they were homeschooled by robots. I can appreciate the maturity level of the kids, but the same movie could have worked with fully grown adult siblings. I’ve seen both of them do cooler things and know they have charisma, their characters just didn’t. Annette Bening, who I always thought was cool, made me really dislike her character. She was too stern and dickish. As much as I didn’t like the character, she deserves major props for doing a great job with it. Julianne Moore does a great job too, but it wasn’t as much of a challenge. You can’t help but like her in her cutesy laid-backness. Mark Ruffalo is a self absorbed bumbling free spirit. His character clashes with the world the couple has set up for their family. It’s an interesting movie and keeps you entertained throughout. Is it the best movie I’ve seen all year? Not at all. It wouldn’t make my Top 10 list, but I can respectable accept someone else being that fond of it and connected to it. It’s worth checking out for sure, but don’t put ahead of anything you’re dying to see. B
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