This fantasy where everyone gets what they want is made awkward and uncomfortable by the lack of chemistry between its stars.
In Hollywood, the industry’s very particular rules of math state that two attractive movie stars should result in at least a semblance of onscreen chemistry. It’s worked for all kinds of bizarre pairings, and it should have worked for Nicole Kidman and Zac Efron, teaming up in A Family Affair for the second time. Kidman is a skilled actor with incredible range and a willingness to take risks on potentially bad projects, and Efron is chiseled, talented and always game for ridiculous comedic scenes centered on self-ridicule. Although separately magnetic and successful in 2012’s The Paperboy, together here the actors fumble for any draw.
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A FAMILY AFFAIR ★1/2 (1.5/4 stars) |
In the film, Efron parodies himself as Chris Cole, a self-absorbed, muscled movie star best known for starring in an action franchise called Icarus Rush. He’s vain, disconnected and apparently hasn’t been in a grocery store in decades. He is constantly breaking up with girlfriends with the help of consolation diamond earrings and his assistant Zara (Joey King), a frazzled young woman who wants to be producing movies despite being in her early 20s and having no experience. Chris is so temperamental and childish that he vacillated between threatening to fire Zara and desperately needing her to get him protein powder from the grocery store he can’t visit himself.
Zara finally hits her limit with Chris’ inane antics and quits, reluctantly telling her highly successful writer of a mom Brooke (Kidman) that she’s now out of a job. Brooke has been single since the death of Zara’s dad, often confiding her woes in her mother-in-law Leila (Kathy Bates), who appears to be some kind of famous photographer. When Chris shows up at Brooke and Zara’s house trying to woo Zara back to work, he ends up bonding—and drinking tequila—with Brooke. It’s an odd dynamic, especially since screenwriter Carrie Solomon and director Richard LaGravenese have already established Chris as a selfish dipshit. It’s hard to understand what Brooke, who quotes Greek mythology and is potentially the hottest MILF on planet Earth, sees in him beyond his biceps. But whatever it is, it’s enough to get them into bed, where Zara immediately discovers them and knocks herself out on the doorway.
The rest of the film is a requisite story about redeeming oneself and making relationships work. You already know the ending without having seen it, although it’s a moderately entertaining diversion to get there. Brooke gets her groove back (this makes for a good double feature with Anne Hathaway’s recent rom-com The Idea of You), Chris gets to make a human connection (and go to a grocery store) and Zara gets to skip years of paying her dues to unrealistically ascend the Hollywood ladder. It aims for emotional sincerity in moments and there are some laughs, thanks mostly to King and Efron’s dynamic, but it’s mostly a surface-level fantasy about two successful, pretty people who find love. The hurdle in their way isn’t the massive age gap or Chris’ unwieldy celebrity, but Zara’s disapproval and whining. It’s all a bit flimsy on paper, although it’s easier to overlook the gaping cracks in the narrative when you’re actually watching Kidman do her thing.
The challenge here is that Kidman and Efron have no spark, which makes it awkward and uncomfortable to witness their coupling. No wonder Zara feels so much ick at the prospect of Brooke and Chris getting together. It’s also difficult to reconcile Chris’s terrible behavior with him becoming a leading man love interest for a woman as smart and worldly as Brooke. But this is a fantasy where everyone gets what they want, even if that in no way aligns with reality. It worked in The Idea of You, a better version of this story, but here you just want Brooke to find a guy who doesn’t need the Icarus myth explained to him. It’s ultimately this lack of chemistry that keeps A Family Affair from transcending an existence as a Lifetime movie aired on Netflix.
