CHOSEN FAMILY - Mark Reviews Movies

Chosen Family, Brainstorm Media

Follow on Facebook | Follow on Twitter | Become a Patron

Review by Mark Dujsik | October 10, 2024

First and foremost, Chosen Family is a terrible comedy, filled with situations strained by circumstance and characters who never feel like real people. It's also an oddly mean movie when writer/director Heather Graham finally gets to the ultimate purpose of this story, which spends almost its entirety trying to figure out what its actual purpose is.

Graham also stars here as Ann, a yoga instructor in a small Rhode Island town who has a bad track record with romantic partners. She has a tendency to dump nice guys and finds appeal in ones with assorted problems, as proven by a brief montage that ends with her apparently trying to revive a guy who has overdosed on something. We're never provided the character's age, but this kind of revelation probably should have happened for Ann some time ago. As youthful and in-shape as Graham may look here, she's not fooling us that this character has the excuse of age going for her in this department.

That realization is one of the multiple subplots and themes running through this mishmash of a story, which is, at different times, a romantic comedy, a comic look at a tight-knit group of friends, and a comedic take on a dysfunctional family. One must describe these things as comedy in a sense of objective distance, because that's obviously what Graham is going for with the movie. Saying it's actually funny in any way, though, would be a stretch.

We'll start with the family, since that's where the story's core finally turns out to be. Ann likes to call herself a people-pleaser, and it apparently started a long time ago with her parents, Alfred (Michael Gross) and Dorothy (Julie Halston), and her younger sister Clio (Julia Stiles). Here's what they're like. Alfred is an ultra-religious man, who constantly criticizes his elder daughter for "living in sin" with various men and not going to church. It doesn't exactly sound as if Ann is even trying to please her father, who's mostly irritating bluster than anything else.

Meanwhile, Dorothy once dreamed of becoming a famous singer, but after marrying and having two children, those dreams stayed as such. The mother wants to make a real go of it now, though, and, for some reason, thinks Ann could arrange a location for a concert Dorothy wants to hold. Ann can't say no to her mother, but apparently, she can't speak to her as a person, either, since the character is so over-the-top delusional.

As for Clio, she's struggling with drug addiction and has just been released again from a rehabilitation facility. There's nothing especially funny about her, her plight, or what's later revealed to a significant factor in Clio's underlying psychological issues, and the movie's alleged status as a comedy certainly hits a big snag once that last part becomes a major but brushed-aside element of the story.

The bulk of that tale, though, revolves around Ann's new romantic relationship with Steve (John Brotherton), a not-yet-divorced man with a young daughter named Lilly (Ella Grace Helton). Everything's fine between the two—better than any relationship Ann has had before, it seems—until the daughter, an absolute nightmare, enters the picture. The girl is intentionally annoying and vindictive beyond belief, insulting Ann at every turn and belittling her own father, who does little if anything to try to stop that behavior.

Is this meant to be funny? It's not, because the kid is so pointedly awful that anyone with a shred of awareness would think it's either a bad joke or a good reason to get out of that situation. Graham and her character don't think it's either, though, and it remains an awkwardly dreadful joke for too long, while Ann just sticks around and keeps taking it. Making matters worse and not showing our protagonist in a particularly endearing light, Ann even starts competing with the girl for Steve's attention and affection. Maybe the problem isn't, as the movie keeps trying to tell us, everyone around Ann, because scenes like a dance contest with a pre-teen are downright embarrassing for her.

The last element is, as the title suggests, Ann spending time with her real support group: friends Max (Thomas Lennon), his wife Frances (Odessa Rae), and his business partner Roz (Andrea Savage). They just want Ann to succeed in life and love and work, unlike her real family members, who are too caught up in their own issues and sabotage her big yoga breakthrough in a climax that's even more humiliating for everyone involved than anything that comes before it.

One can understand the sentiment Graham is going for with this movie. Chosen Family, though, is so focused on trying to be funny that it's never sincere—or funny, although that's a separate matter.

Back to Home

Buy Related Products