Mr. Mom (1983)

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Directed by Stan Dragoti.

Starring Teri Garr, Taliesin Jaffe, Michael Keaton, Frederick Koehler, Brittany White.

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Jack Butler (Michael Keaton) is a Detroit automobile engineer unjustly fired by his boss. Jack's wife Caroline (Teri Garr) is compelled to get a job to make ends meet, and is soon hired on as an advertising executive in a firm run by the shifty Ron Richardson (Martin Mull. This leaves Jack at home doing the housework and taking care of the kids, which he discovers is a lot more complicated than he ever imagined. Moving from breadwinner to househusband doesn't do much for his self-esteem, and he bides his time playing poker for 10-cents-off coupons with a gaggle of neighborhood housewifes and pondering infidelity with dedicated homewrecker Joan (Ann Jillian). Among Keaton's fish-out-of-water bits: trying to maneuver a shopping cart with the inevitable wobbly wheels; and imagining a soap opera-cum-film noir episode in which he gives in to Joan's advances, only to be found out by Caroline. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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The Faux Feminism of Mr. Mom
by SpoutBlog in SpoutBlog on spout.com

hasn't rated it.

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"While I’m on the subject of film studies classes I’m taking this semester, here’s another story inspired by a film I watched at school yesterday. In Women in Film, which, in case you can’t tell, is a class on feminist film theory, we screened Marleen Gorris’ mind-numbing debut A Question of Silence (original Dutch title: De Stilte rond Christine M.). While bored from the obviousness of the film, which tells the story of three women on trial for the random murder of a boutique salesman, I thought about how much it reminded me of 9 to 5, a movie I would have much preferred to be watching (and not just because the music is soooo much better). Then, as my mind kept wandering, I realized that three popular movies I loved as a small child were 9 to 5, The Incredible Shrinking Woman and Mr. Mom, all silly comedies made and set in the early ’80s (as was Gorris’ film), all obviously informed by the women’s movement of that time, which could each be given a serious reading from a feminist fi ... " [More]

Review by All Movie Guide

All Movie Guide

is neutral about it.

The gender-role comedy Mr. Mom does a fine job mining fertile comedic territory. In addition to nailing the grand themes of a man forced out of his conventional role of family breadwinner, the screenplay finds lots of cute ways to combine male and female stereotypes. Jack and the other housewives playing poker for coupons is just one witty example. Michael Keaton's performance is one of the keys to the film's success. As he finds himself slipping into more and more feminine roles, the film doesn't get laughs out of a man acting like a woman, it gets laughs out of a man suffering the emotional stress associated with traditional women's roles. Jack is not a sexist pig who learns how hard his unappreciated wife works; he is a good husband and father who learns that raising children and taking care of a house is stressful and demanding. Since Jack is sympathetic throughout, the audience laughs with him in recognition, not at him in derision. That is what makes this family-comedy worth sharing with the family. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide

Tags: family , home , unemployment , childrearing , housework
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