The Brady Bunch Movie
(1995)
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The popular 70s TV show makes a graceful transition to the big screen in this light-hearted feature that's part parody and part homage. The plot here (about a ruthless land developer who wants to buy the Brady home) is secondary to the playful juxtaposition of the Brady's era with our own. The film dotes on the peculiarities of 70s fashion and lingo with an almost religious fervor. The kids seem as lost in their wide-collared, pastel shirts as they do in their anachronistic moral universe. Marcia, for instance, is oblivious to the come-ons from a lesbian friend and she haughtily informs a date that she doesn't go to "third base." Several members of the original cast make cameo appearances. |
In the 1990s, Hollywood studios desperately ransacked their old TV archives for cinema remake material, with very mixed results. This is probably the most innovative of the lot, even if it doesn't always work. For those who missed them first time around, the Brady Bunch were a cute-as-pie 1970s American family who suffered the mildest of domestic discord every week. For this movie the same applies — except that everyone else is now living in the 1990s. The result is a postmodernist hoot, expertly served up by a cast headed by Shelley Long and Gary Cole, and essential viewing for fans of flares everywhere.
Halliwell's Film Guide
Pleasantly amusing comedy that exploits the gap between the fantasy of family relationships and the reality, though it will mean most to viewers of the original TV sitcom.