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Film
Slavish devotion to a legendary dad
[Photo: MGM Pictures]
Three generations of the Gromberg family — Mitchell, Alex and Asher (left to right) -- are played by three generations of the Douglas family -- Kirk, Michael and Cameron -- in It Runs in the Family. |
By STEVE PERSALL, Times Film Critic
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 24, 2003
Michael Douglas tries far too hard in a sappy, contrived It Runs in the Family. Rent Spartacus instead.
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One benefit of being a movie star, I guess, is not needing slide shows or scrapbooks to recount family memories. With the right amount of clout, an entire feature film with kin can be produced for old times' sake.
It Runs in the Family is the most obvious example. We have Michael Douglas as producer and star, hiring his ailing, legendary father Kirk Douglas, his son Cameron, who hasn't acted on screen in nearly 20 years (and it shows), and his mother, Diana, who, although divorced from Kirk for a half-century and out of acting for a decade, agreed to one more dance with the camera and her ex-husband.
Feel the love, if you can get beyond that feeling of boredom. For all its good intentions, It Runs in the Family plays like a wake with a screenplay. Audiences won't have nearly as much fun as the Douglases apparently did while making it. We're left with that sinking feeling and forced tolerance when neighbors pull out family albums to share memories that mean more to them than anyone else.
Michael and Kirk Douglas reportedly searched for years to find a screenplay so they could work together. What they settled for in Jesse Wigutow's script suggests they should have kept looking. Or perhaps, sad to say, the son doesn't believe his father will be alive long enough to find a suitable screenplay, so this will have to do.
Michael Douglas plays Alex Gromberg, an attorney with too much on his docket. Kirk plays his father, Mitchell, who founded the law firm and lives a lavish retirement with his wife Evelyn (Diana). Mitchell is hobbled by the effects of a stroke -- as Kirk Douglas was in 1995 -- but is still feisty. Cameron Douglas plays Alex's son Asher, a slacker marijuana dealer. Rory Culkin co-stars as the other son/grandson Eli, apparently because Michael's toddler son with Catherine Zeta-Jones isn't old enough to learn his lines yet.
And wouldn't Zeta-Jones playing Alex's wife make more sense in the scheme of things than Bernadette Peters? Not that it matters, since the role is designed only for dewy-eyed wifely support, then dewy-eyed disappointment when she thinks Alex is having an affair.
That infidelity subplot is never fully examined, in line with every other subplot in Wigutow's screenplay. Asher's eventual drug bust is brushed off with some tears and a technicality. Evelyn's dialysis treatments are here only for Asher to be irresponsible and Kirk Douglas to play one last romantic scene, then a grieving one. Alex's workplace dishes out hints of office politics that are dangled without resolution. Eli's bourgeois shyness suggests an interesting pairing with a 12-year-old goth chick (Irene Gorovaia) who disappears when it's getting interesting.
Each scene in It Runs in the Family is merely a set-up for the next designated Kirk-and-Michael moment. The love these two men share is obvious, even in contentious scenes. The son surrenders the spotlight to his father, even if it doesn't help tell a story. There comes a point when the pleasure of seeing Kirk at work again wears off, and we wonder if this frail, shuffling, speech-impeded manner is the way we want to remember Spartacus. It Runs in the Family means well, but seems like an overly labored labor of love.
[Photo: MGM Pictures]
Father and son Kirk and Michael Douglas star onscreen together for the first time.
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It Runs in the Family
- Grade: C-
- Director: Fred Schepisi
- Cast: Michael Douglas, Kirk Douglas, Cameron Douglas, Diana Douglas, Bernadette Peters, Rory Culkin
- Screenplay: Jesse Wigutow
- Rating: PG-13; profanity, drug content, sexual situations
- Running time: 109 min.
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