You might think Kirk Douglas incapable of appearing in really bad movies but he's done a stinker or two and this one definitely qualifies. It borrows liberally from another movie where Dan Akroyd played Kirk's troubled adult son and Kirk, having suffered a recent stroke, had to make him believe before the credits rolled that he always loved him and did the best he could for him. That movie wasn't bad, as I recall, whereas this one stinks to high hell and there's nothing to be done about it. Almost every emotional moment comes off forced and false. That said, even with his speech impediment and other post-stroke problems, Kirk hands in by far the most competent performance. Unfortunately, it is clearly not nearly enough to elevate the horrible writing, stupid plot line, and pathetic performances of his fellow actors. Michael Douglas is a total turkey in this abysmal flick, in which he fends off another aggressive female intent on "raping him." You've done that one already, Mike, remember? Bernadette Peters, although looking surprisingly fit for a woman her age, is photographed from some very poor angles and just looks odd too much of the time. Her part is completely forgettable. The youngest Douglas comes off as a complete jerk (to use a less offensive term than the one I actually have in mind). The scene in which he's finally going to make love to the cute young girl he's been after for half the movie, then decides he can't have sex with her after all because "it wouldn't be right," is almost as shmarmy but not nearly as offensive as the scene where the same girl goes to his dorm room and finds him enthusiastically disco-dancing with his male roommate. Douglas really gets into it and I vaguely felt like throwing up. The part where Kirk and Michael send Kirk's dead brother across a suburban lake in a boat that they have torched, ala "The Vikings," is just kind of dumb but hardly the dumbest moment in a flick chock full of dumb moments. The Seder scene with everyone in their yarmulkes is just plain silly, in my opinion. OK, granted I'm not Jewish, but I think that is one tradition that ought to go the way, the skull caps on grown men, I mean. The youngest Douglas looks absolutely ridiculous in his because he plays an unrepentant dope dealer, but gee, he's got to wear his yarmulke for Seder to keep the older folks happy. It's ridiculous. In short, this movie is phony, false, forced, and exploitive of Kirk Douglas's various handicaps following his stroke. The entire Douglas clan ought to be thoroughly embarrassed for appearing in this piece of dung, because that is what it is. Kirk is capable of standout work and doesn't even scratch the surface of his capabilities simply because this movie, itself, is dead on arrival and nothing he does to resuscitate it has a chance to succeed.
Review of It Runs in the Family
