Netflix New Comedy United Two Mega Stars With Hilarious Results
Hilarious is not always a good thing when it comes to romantic comedies, and the coming together of Nicole Kidman and Zac Efron in A Family Affair on Netflix is one such instance when the entire premise is hilarious, but the movie is… not so much.
I was looking forward to A Family Affair on Netflix as I love both Zac Efron and Nicole Kidman, and I have to say I was sorely disappointed. Still, I liked it more than The Idea of You, the other May-December romance film out this year with beautiful people, so there’s that.
A Family Affair Has No Surprises
A Family Affair is precisely what the trailer makes it out to be —- a movie about a young hunky Hollywood star who falls in love with his assistant’s widowed mother. The film opens with said star, Chris Cole (Zac Efron), demanding ridiculous tasks from his assistant, Zara (Joey King). He wants the perfect smoothie, the perfect latte, treats for his dogs, and yet another set of diamond earrings for his latest conquest, with whom he is about to ditch.
It’s Not About Sly & The Family Stone
Efron’s Chris is vain, self-conscious, weak-willed, and pathetically authoritarian. He constantly threatens to fire his highly ambitious assistant, and she is conflicted between fear of losing her job and relief over finally being done with him. At the end of one particularly grueling day with Chris, Zara heads home, where she lives with her mother, Brooke Harwood (Nicole Kidman), completing the family affair.
Attempts To Go Deep
You see, Brooke is a famous writer —- the author of several books that seem to be creative nonfiction-type memoirs and a guest writer for Vogue magazine, which sends fabulous designer gowns to her lovely, looming home as payment. We get early on that Zara finds it difficult to live up to her mother’s stellar reputation and muses over the fact that she’s still “just an assistant” making her way through her twenties. A Family Affair wants to go deeper than just rom-com status.
Kidman And Efron Have No Chemistry
The drama really begins when Chris arrives at Brooke’s home to beg Zara to come back to work after the two have a fight and falls instantly in love with the lovely mother. It isn’t that this romance is unbelievable. It’s much more realistic than the one between Anne Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine from The Idea of You.
Rather, it’s the energy between the two that feels entirely impalpable in A Family Affair. There’s no “there” there.
Of course, Zara finds out about the affair and gets angry. There’s a simple plot twist and a happy ending. It all wraps up just fine. And that’s all there really is to say about the movie in terms of ratings.
Goes Beyond The One Joke
It’s just… fine. The actors try hard, and Kathy Bates, as Brooke’s editor/mother-in-law, is fun as always. Efron is over-the-top goofy, and Nicole Kidman is ethereal in her beauty.
Perhaps the saving grace of A Family Affair is that it doesn’t constantly rag on about the age difference, about the beautiful woman’s insecurities about being with a younger man, and about the younger man’s insistence that he’d prefer her over any woman in the world. It’s just a rom-com with some drama. Hollywood has finally made a movie without a gorgeous woman trying to convince us she’s plain, normal, or “ugly.”
Streaming Exclusively On Netflix
REVIEW SCORE
The thing I didn’t love about The Idea of You is the one thing I appreciated about A Family Affair. If you watch this movie, watch it for that. Jeff Goldblum is married to a woman who is 30 years his senior, and no one bats an eye.
Nicole Kidman could absolutely hook up with Zac Efron without the world losing its mind. It’s too bad they have no chemistry here. Check out A Family Affair for yourself on Netflix.
