The Kids Are All Right Film Review

Fox News' Bill O' Reilly would hate the film, The Kids Are All Right. If you recall O'Reilly had a war of words with Jennifer Aniston about her statements that a woman may not need a man in a relationship to have a child. You see he thought she was preaching to young girls that they don't need a father to have children and thought that her words were destructive to society. The Kids Are All Right is a movie about a lesbian couple raising two children conceived by a sperm donor without a father. That should make Bill 'O's blood boil.

Nic (Annette Bening) and Jules (Julianne Moore) are the lesbian couple who are growing comfortably into middle age. Nic is a doctor. Jules wants to start a landscaping company. They each gave birth to a child using the sperm donated by Paul (Mark Ruffalo), a restaurateur. Daughter Joni (Mia Wasikowska, Alice in Wonderland, 2010) is eighteen and about ready to go to college. Son Laser (Josh Hutcherson, Journey to the Center of the Earth, 2008) is your typical male teenager, i.e., he is curious about drugs, plays sports, and wants to know who his father is.

Laser convinces his sister to go to the sperm donor bank and request the name of their parents sperm donor. They arrange a covert meeting with Paul and begin to bond with him. This creates a problem since Nic and Jules don't know how to handle the biological father's entrance into their lives.

Director Lisa Cholodenko and Stuart Blumberg's script traces the lives of an unconventional family that is becoming more and more familiar. And if California's Proposition 8 stays dead, a married lesbian couple rasing children could become mainstream in our society. Anyway, the screenplay's dialogue rings true. The story is touching. yet it doesn't canonize these people, it shows them in all their weaknesses. It's also funny. Nic's aid to sexual arousal will have you laughing. Director Lisa Cholodenko gets the emotion of the characters out without excessive melodrama. And the ensemble cast is perfect. All of the performances are genuine. These are people that feel like your neighbors. One last thing on the actors, Yaya DaCosta who plays Paul's lover, Tanya, is one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood.

Finally, a film that should be nominated for the Academy's Best Picture. The Kids Are All Right is a movie that deals with the sexual nature of adults and even though it's not suitable for children, it's still a lovely family film. The grade is A.