THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT 2.5/4
Focus Features, Rated R
Creating the world rather than reflecting it is nothing new in Hollywood, and The Kids Are All Right is no exception. A contradictory mix of a same-sex non-traditional and traditional family values, this married-lesbians-with-kids dramedy seems to want to have its conservative cake and eat it too—liberally. Meanwhile, all sorts of elephants in the room—having to do with the conflicts and stresses experienced by gays or by those being raised by them—get the strictly silent treatment.
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Julianne Moore and Annette Bening are Jules and Nic, a long-married lesbian Southern California suburban couple with possibly the most pleasant and raging hormone-free teenagers in movie history. Joni (Mia Wasikowska)—whose mother is Nic, has just turned 18, and her younger brother Laser (Josh Hutcherson)—the offspring of Jules—is eager to track down the sperm donor dad the half-siblings share. But since he isn’t old enough to do so, he pressures Joni into contacting the sperm bank instead.
Annette Bening (L.) and Julianne Moore star in The Kids Are All Right
Their dad, who they are delighted to discover is red tape-free, is Paul (Mark Ruffalo), a carefree party animal bachelor kinda guy who cruises around on his motorcycle when not tending to his organic restaurant stocked with veggies he grows himself. And while Mom and Mom fret about this new male center of attention thrust into their lives, Paul couldn’t be more thrilled to discover a pair of terrific children of his own that he never had to bother raising.
But the family is threatened with being torn apart when perky underachiever Jules, who tends to be demeaned by her control freak physician/family breadwinner partner, is drawn sexually to a far-from-uninterested Paul, who displays a whole lot more appreciation for her untapped talents than Nic. So ensues the classic extra-marital affair, except with a not-exactly-minor detail. Jules abruptly backs out of the steamy tryst after insisting she’s an orthodox lesbian, even though there was no doubt about just how hot the sex on display was, that played out on screen.
The Kids Are All Right stakes out its story around an atypical, too picture-perfect gay family whose biggest problem in life seems to be a heterosexual male, seemingly set up unfairly to take a hit, while not a single divisive social issue rears its head. It’s ultimately the knockout performances of this convincing cast, so passionately dedicated to some fairly awkward material, that salvages this story from a couple of contrived plot points demonizing heterosexuality in an otherwise problem-free world.
