Raising Helen

Uneven comedy drama about a fast living fashion designer assistant, Helen Harris (Kate Hudson), and her journey of self discovery. She has two older sisters, the oldest one being Lindsay (Felicity Huffman) and the 2nd oldest being Jenny (Joan Cusack) with Helen being the baby of the 3. Though they all love each other dearly, Helen and Lindsay seem to have the strongest bond while poor Jenny is the odd girl out, even though she raised Helen mostly by herself after their mom died and Lindsay was in New York trying to make it as a dancer. Lindsay and Jenny are both married and have kids, while Helen is not but Lindsay's kids, especially 15 year old Audrey (Hayden Panettiere), think she's the coolest aunt in the world.

Then Lindsay and her husband die in a car accident and guess who Lindsay chose to raise the kids? Helen! Even though Jenny is clearly more qualified thanks to her lifetime of motherhood, Lindsay decided to fork the kids over to Helen who not only smokes but has no idea of how to raise kids. Predictably, this throws Helen's life all out of whack as she is forced to move and find a new job and finds herself in an awkward relationship with the principal of the kids new school, Lutheran man Pastor Dan (John Corbett reprising his nice guy persona from "My Big Fat Greek Wedding"). Well, 6 or 7 year old Sarah has trouble grasping the concept of death and 10 year old Henry (Spencer Breslin) is in a depression while the hormonal and rather horny Audrey thinks that having Helen for a guardian means that Helen will indulge all the teen girl desires that her mother would never have allowed her to indulge. Audrey is quite surprised when Helen calls on their aluminum baseball bat wielding Indian neighbor Nilma to get rid of a bunch of hoodlum punks she has made friends with and brought up to Helen's apartment. "What's the matter with you?!" the obnoxious 15 year old screams. "Don't you remember what it's like to be young?!" Helen replies to Audrey's cliché insult "Yeah, it was last Wednesday!" Later on, Audrey almost ruins her life when she ditches a prom she was attending to go off with her hoodlum "DJ" boyfriend to a motel intending to have sex, only to be rescued/thwarted by Aunt Jenny the supermom and Helen. In a scene both funny and dramatic, Jenny uses her pregnant belly as a form of terror and metaphor for teen parenthood against the boyfriend. In the end, Helen finally finds the strength to be a parental figure and all is relatively right with the world.

Kate Hudson is cute and has some comedic ability, but her mother, actress Goldie Hawn, was even cuter and funnier when she was the same age Kate is now and still is. Kate works hard to make you like Helen but this is the kind of character (and scenario) her mother would have pulled off without breaking a sweat. Maybe Kate should give up comedy and focus on becoming a dramatic actress. Either way though, Kate is easily out-acted by co-star Joan Cusack, a tall, gangly woman who's wasp like face can be made to look a lot better or a lot worse; Joan makes you feel more for Jenny than Helen, which is not the right effect I think. John Corbett also overshadows Kate in this film. Helen Mirren makes the most of her role as Helen's ice like boss. I wasn't a big fan of the kids. The worst offender though was Audrey; Hollywood is really starting to scare me with their idolizing teen girls. That and the fact that Audrey, even by growing pain standards, is a bitch to deal with, a 39 year old whore trapped in a 15 year old girl's body. Are 15 year old girls REALLY this horny in real life? And do they really get THIS sucked up with bad boys? I kept waiting for someone to smack her. Personally they should have let her ruin her life by having sex, it would have served her right the bitch. You hang out with trash like this "DJ" as she calls him then you're asking for it.

Garry Marshall has this thing about doing variations on the Cinderella concept. For example, "Pretty Woman" was about a downtrodden woman who got elevated into a better life. Here, he reverses things so that the woman already has it all and learns that the smaller way of life is good too. Too bad it wasn't a better film.