Yours, Mine and Ours Feature Article
—1. Overview (multimedia)
—2. Overview Basic (dial up speed)
—3. Reviews and Blogs
—4. Cast and Crew
—5. Photo Pages
—6. Trailers, Clips, DVDs, Books, Soundtrack
—7. Posters (Dennis Quaid)
—8. Production Notes (pdf)
—9. Spiritual Connections
—10. Presentation Downloads
Director Raja Gosnell impressed me with his unapologetic tone when the critics in our interview room were hammering him. He set out to make a movie, and he made it the way he wanted it. As it turns out, the interviews with the cast and filmmakers turned me around on this film.
I wasn’t particularly impressed with the film at first, but the cast and crew revealed the heart of their mission: to create a fun family film. Everyone seemed genuinely excited about the movie. The expressions on their faces and their voices conveyed a sense of gratification from a job well done. Dennis Quaid said, "I always thought this was a romantic comedy with kids. Most of the time I know when I go see a family film with my son, it'll be a really nice nap for me. There's nothing in it for me. But, this I thought had something for everybody."
The film deviates drastically from the original, but again, there are no apologies. Screenwriters Ron Burch and David Kidd were very familiar with the original film but did not take the same direction or storyline. When asked if the studios wanted them to change it up, they said they were asked to contemporize it. "That has as much to do with the structure of the film as it does with any story specifics or things like that...The original film was very funny and very warm, but very much a kind of slice of life comedy. It doesn't really drive the way people demand their family comedies to drive now. That was probably the biggest challenge. How do you make the film, which theoretically should be about relationship? How do you give it a drive? And that's really what they meant by contemporize." They also wanted to avoid a comparison situation. Burch said, "We were kind of relieved that we didn't have to frame for frame remake the original film, because there is no way you could compare. There's no way you could compete. Rene Russo is not Lucille Ball and she'd be forever compared to Lucille Ball. I think with the role she has now, she won't be compared to Lucille Ball. She is her own character, her own person..." Their expectation is that viewers will go back home, rent the original and really enjoy it as a different film.
Burch and Kidd also changed up the original by exploring the conflict between the merging family members rather than focusing on the individual conflicts within each separate family. In an effort to develop the theme of learning to love people who are different, they created conflicts between the kids. The three actors who portrayed teens in the film explained their characters' arcs along the lines of these conflicts. Katija Pevec played the popular cheerleader, Christina Beardsley, who was the exact opposite of her new sister Phoebe North (Danielle Panabaker). She described her character's turning point, "They go through a boy situation...That was the turning point at the party scene when they (the sisters) kind of clicked. She makes it know that her sister is more important than a boy." Drake Bell, who played Dillan North, explained that his graffitti-loving character went through a change as a result of helping his brother make flyers to become class president. In the end, he decided that he didn't want to break the family up, but wanted to make it work. Sean Faris played William Beardsley, the ringleader in the effort to break up the parents. He explained that his character changed, "...when everything started coming together and they started developing a friendship without realizing it because they were teaming up. At the moment that the breakup happens, he realizes what he's just lost..." In each of the kids' conflicts, the moral of the story was "Together is better."
In conversations later with the other reviewers, we thought that contemporizing the film also translated to simply adding more slapstick. In the fashion of other successful films like Home Alone, Parent Trap and Cheaper by the Dozen, Yours, Mine and Ours centers much of the story around those kid-friendly slips and falls. Dennis Quaid described his experience with getting slimed, "It wasn't so bad. All the ten year olds want to get slimed. I took my own son to the Nickelodeon Kids Choice awards all the time and he always gets up front to get slimed." Director Raja Gosnell told us, however, that he wanted to go a little deeper than that. "I've done the prat falls, I've done the slips and falls, and the other stuff, but here's a love story which takes place inside that movie and it's very, very unusual that in any sort of kid movie that there's an adult love story. And I wanted to somewhat ground it in reality. So, the challenge of juggling those two worlds to have that legitimate love, this ligitimate marriage that breaks up and to really feel the weight of that, the weight that the kids have to feel, the consequences of what they've done was really really important to me. Combining that with the slapstick...that was our attempt to make a movie that appealed to six year-olds to sixty."
One reviewer asked about the fact that the original film had more spirituality in it than this version. Ron Birch explained, "I like to think there is a lot of spirituality in it without an overt reference to religion. We did want them to get married. We did want a spirit of love and acceptance to pervade the film. Because ultimately the larger issue in the original film is about acceptance...We didn't want to exclude anyone [religion-wise], so we just didn't pick one." Gosnell also explained that the film deals somewhat with the concept of consequence. Although he didn't set out to highlight the idea, he said, "People do tend to find someone else to blame, whether it's the government or the guy next door, or something else. So, for people to stand up and take responsibility and actually deal with what they've done and how they're gonna fix it, is a good message."
Most likely critics will attack this film for the overuse of slapstick, the predictabile plot, or the fact that it's different from the original. But I think it was Gosnell that really turned me around on this film. In his cool, collected voice he said, "Movies that please mass audiences rarely seem to please critics." He explained that the critics are going to do their jobs, but that his motive is different. He said, "My favorite thing is to sit in the theater and watch families from little kids, to moms and dads, to grandmas laughing and having a good time and enjoying a family night out. If I can provide that, then that's rewarding for me."
—1. Overview (multimedia)
—2. Overview Basic (dial up speed)
—3. Reviews and Blogs
—4. Cast and Crew
—5. Photo Pages
—6. Trailers, Clips, DVDs, Books, Soundtrack
—7. Posters (Dennis Quaid)
—8. Production Notes (pdf)
—9. Spiritual Connections
—10. Presentation Downloads
—2. Overview Basic (dial up speed)
—3. Reviews and Blogs
—4. Cast and Crew
—5. Photo Pages
—6. Trailers, Clips, DVDs, Books, Soundtrack
—7. Posters (Dennis Quaid)
—8. Production Notes (pdf)
—9. Spiritual Connections
—10. Presentation Downloads
Director Raja Gosnell impressed me with his unapologetic tone when the critics in our interview room were hammering him. He set out to make a movie, and he made it the way he wanted it. As it turns out, the interviews with the cast and filmmakers turned me around on this film.I wasn’t particularly impressed with the film at first, but the cast and crew revealed the heart of their mission: to create a fun family film. Everyone seemed genuinely excited about the movie. The expressions on their faces and their voices conveyed a sense of gratification from a job well done. Dennis Quaid said, "I always thought this was a romantic comedy with kids. Most of the time I know when I go see a family film with my son, it'll be a really nice nap for me. There's nothing in it for me. But, this I thought had something for everybody."
The film deviates drastically from the original, but again, there are no apologies. Screenwriters Ron Burch and David Kidd were very familiar with the original film but did not take the same direction or storyline. When asked if the studios wanted them to change it up, they said they were asked to contemporize it. "That has as much to do with the structure of the film as it does with any story specifics or things like that...The original film was very funny and very warm, but very much a kind of slice of life comedy. It doesn't really drive the way people demand their family comedies to drive now. That was probably the biggest challenge. How do you make the film, which theoretically should be about relationship? How do you give it a drive? And that's really what they meant by contemporize." They also wanted to avoid a comparison situation. Burch said, "We were kind of relieved that we didn't have to frame for frame remake the original film, because there is no way you could compare. There's no way you could compete. Rene Russo is not Lucille Ball and she'd be forever compared to Lucille Ball. I think with the role she has now, she won't be compared to Lucille Ball. She is her own character, her own person..." Their expectation is that viewers will go back home, rent the original and really enjoy it as a different film.
Burch and Kidd also changed up the original by exploring the conflict between the merging family members rather than focusing on the individual conflicts within each separate family. In an effort to develop the theme of learning to love people who are different, they created conflicts between the kids. The three actors who portrayed teens in the film explained their characters' arcs along the lines of these conflicts. Katija Pevec played the popular cheerleader, Christina Beardsley, who was the exact opposite of her new sister Phoebe North (Danielle Panabaker). She described her character's turning point, "They go through a boy situation...That was the turning point at the party scene when they (the sisters) kind of clicked. She makes it know that her sister is more important than a boy." Drake Bell, who played Dillan North, explained that his graffitti-loving character went through a change as a result of helping his brother make flyers to become class president. In the end, he decided that he didn't want to break the family up, but wanted to make it work. Sean Faris played William Beardsley, the ringleader in the effort to break up the parents. He explained that his character changed, "...when everything started coming together and they started developing a friendship without realizing it because they were teaming up. At the moment that the breakup happens, he realizes what he's just lost..." In each of the kids' conflicts, the moral of the story was "Together is better."
In conversations later with the other reviewers, we thought that contemporizing the film also translated to simply adding more slapstick. In the fashion of other successful films like Home Alone, Parent Trap and Cheaper by the Dozen, Yours, Mine and Ours centers much of the story around those kid-friendly slips and falls. Dennis Quaid described his experience with getting slimed, "It wasn't so bad. All the ten year olds want to get slimed. I took my own son to the Nickelodeon Kids Choice awards all the time and he always gets up front to get slimed." Director Raja Gosnell told us, however, that he wanted to go a little deeper than that. "I've done the prat falls, I've done the slips and falls, and the other stuff, but here's a love story which takes place inside that movie and it's very, very unusual that in any sort of kid movie that there's an adult love story. And I wanted to somewhat ground it in reality. So, the challenge of juggling those two worlds to have that legitimate love, this ligitimate marriage that breaks up and to really feel the weight of that, the weight that the kids have to feel, the consequences of what they've done was really really important to me. Combining that with the slapstick...that was our attempt to make a movie that appealed to six year-olds to sixty."
One reviewer asked about the fact that the original film had more spirituality in it than this version. Ron Birch explained, "I like to think there is a lot of spirituality in it without an overt reference to religion. We did want them to get married. We did want a spirit of love and acceptance to pervade the film. Because ultimately the larger issue in the original film is about acceptance...We didn't want to exclude anyone [religion-wise], so we just didn't pick one." Gosnell also explained that the film deals somewhat with the concept of consequence. Although he didn't set out to highlight the idea, he said, "People do tend to find someone else to blame, whether it's the government or the guy next door, or something else. So, for people to stand up and take responsibility and actually deal with what they've done and how they're gonna fix it, is a good message."
Most likely critics will attack this film for the overuse of slapstick, the predictabile plot, or the fact that it's different from the original. But I think it was Gosnell that really turned me around on this film. In his cool, collected voice he said, "Movies that please mass audiences rarely seem to please critics." He explained that the critics are going to do their jobs, but that his motive is different. He said, "My favorite thing is to sit in the theater and watch families from little kids, to moms and dads, to grandmas laughing and having a good time and enjoying a family night out. If I can provide that, then that's rewarding for me."
—1. Overview (multimedia)
—2. Overview Basic (dial up speed)
—3. Reviews and Blogs
—4. Cast and Crew
—5. Photo Pages
—6. Trailers, Clips, DVDs, Books, Soundtrack
—7. Posters (Dennis Quaid)
—8. Production Notes (pdf)
—9. Spiritual Connections
—10. Presentation Downloads
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