A FAMILY AFFAIR

This is the kind of role that Zac Efron can do in his sleep. Which is apt, considering he and his co-stars sleepwalk there way through this by the numbers rom-com.

When Zara Ford’s (Joey King) egocentric Hollywood boss Chris (Zac Efron) begins to date her mum Brooke (Nicole Kidman) it threatens to tear both her work life and her family life apart.

A big problem that A Family Affair has is its own basic premise. Efrons Chris Cole is set up to be this irredeemable monster who makes everyones life hell. But other than one scene, which results in Zara quitting her job, we don’t really see this.

Yes, he comes across as entitled. A little out of touch. But then this quickly gives way to what the film will have you believe is genuine charm and tenderness. His inevitable redemption feels nowhere near as impactful as it could, because the filmmakers seem too scared to allow Zac Efron to be seen in an overwhelmingly negative light.

In fact it is Joey Kings Zara who ends up coming across worse as the film progresses. She is equally as entitled as Chris, uses people to her own ends, dismissing them if they outgrow their usefulness, and is so self absorbed she is completely out of touch with those she purports to care about. And when her inevitable redemption comes around - and it is given about 1/20th of the time that Chris’s is - it feels unearned. 

And then, the third point of this little triangle, Nicole Kidmans Brooke, basically doesn’t have a personality. She has a dead husband, and the film tries to position this as a personality, but outside of this there is absolutely nothing to her. Her characterisation is so poor that they don’t even bother to make her a stereotype. She exists solely as a device. A plot point. And it’s lazy.

And why was this released in June? It’s set at Christmas, so why not package it as a Christmas film and release it when audience standards are so much lower. With a little rejigging this might have worked as a Christmas film, but the fact it has been released at the start of summer, with very little fanfare considering its cast, goes to show that Netflix just wanted it done. They’ve shoved it into a gap in their schedule and chucked it out when people aren’t paying attention.

There have been some comparisons between this and Prime Videos The Idea of You, which was released earlier this year, but other than the fact that Kidman is older than Efron, I think this is wide of the mark.

The Idea of You managed to take social commentary around fandom, and the double standards the media apply to age differences in celebrity couple, and package it as a mainstream romantic comedy that fizzed with chemistry and authenticity.

Whereas A Family Affair is a chemistry vacuum. A sterile cash grab, banking on the names of its trio of leads to bring in audiences of different generations. It has nothing to say, nothing to add to the increasingly crammed rom-com market, and no reason for existing beyond Netflix’s incessant need to produce mass market content for an audience too bored to switch off.

It is the definition of a cookie-cutter rom-com. All of the pieces are there, they’re just not very well done. The meet cute is lazy, and the drama contrived. The burgeoning romance feels forced, with no real explanation as to why these two like each other, and our apparent hero is almost impossible to route for.

It fizzles rather than fizzes.

And a rom-com that doesn’t fizz… doesn’t work