The Family Stone film review

certificate_PG

THE FAMILY STONE

There's nothing sly about The Family Stone, a warm-hearted concoction that is meant to bring a little bit of Christmas cheer into our lives but may well have audiences wishing they had chosen another film instead. The tale of a semi-functional family led by Diane Keaton and Craig T Nelson weaves as many issues as it can into its thin comedic frame: so be prepared for disease, death, disability, homosexuality, race relations and adoption all to be treated in about as ineffective a way as it is possible to believe, all under the auspices of a family comedy.

When successful businessman Everett Stone (Dermot Mulroney) brings his uptight girlfriend Meredith (Sarah Jessica Parker) home for the holidays, there can only be trouble in store. His liberal family - who are variously suffering from a secret disease, disabled or in love with the wrong person - hate her, and make her stay so unwelcome that she has to move into a local hotel until her sister (Claire Danes) arrives as back-up.

Meanwhile we learn more about Everett's motley relatives: a tomboyish but lovesick younger sister (Rachel McAdams), a deaf brother (Ty Giordano) who is agonizing over whether to adopt a baby with his black boyfriend, and the family stoner, brother Ben (Luke Wilson), who has plenty of joints ready for the Christmas break.

So self-involved are these people - and to be honest so distinctly unlikeable - that their cold treatment of Meredith comes as little surprise. But it also presents one of the film's many flaws: in the face of such shockingly nice, yet false, people, we begin to root for the woman who is supposed to be the monster of the piece.

Mini-drama after crisis after problem besets the family but just in case anyone forgets it is meant to be a comedy there are plenty of supposedly farcical moments thrown in for good measure. But once Claire Danes arrives, the story seems to become completely redundant, and takes so many sickly twists and turns that it's hard to see it convincing anyone.

Despite decent performances from some familiar faces, they are let down by material which isn't even second rate, and which tries to cram far too much into too short a time. By the end the film is simply unbelievable, and laughable for all the wrong reasons. Worst of all, this is certainly not the type of family that most people would want to spend Christmas with.

Paul Hurley