MVD Entertainment Group
announced its first Marquee Collection status title this past week. Set to arrive on Blu-ray for the first time on
Jan. 22 will be director Howard Deutch’s 1994 comedy, Getting Even With Dad,
teaming Macaulay Culkin with Ted Danson.
Ted Danson had just
wrapped his decade-long run as Sam Malone in Cheers and returned to
the big screen for another crack at a hit comedy — during his Cheers
run he starred in both 3 Men and a Baby (1987) and 3 Men
and a Little Lady (1990) — and landed this against-character role in Howard
Deutch’s follow-up to Pretty in Pink (1986), Some
Kind of Wonderful (1987) and The Great Outdoors (1988).
Enter Macaulay Culkin,
who was making the transition from child star — Home Alone (1990) and Home
Alone 2 (1992) — to teenager, rebellious teenager at that (out of the
view of the public at the time was a rapidly deteriorating relationship with
his father).
The critics savaged the
film at the time, because they didn’t get what they expected. Time and distance has made Getting
Even With Dad a far more interesting comedy, especially when you take
into consideration where everyone involved was coming from at the time.
The backbone of the story
has a sullen Culkin, being left with his ex-con father (Danson), while the aunt
(played by Kathleen Wilhoite) who raised him — following his mother’s death —
is off on her honeymoon. Unknown to
both aunt and son is that dear old dad is planning a heist with cohorts Bobby (Saul
Rubinek) and Carl (Gailard Sartain) and has no time for the son he hardly knows
(time in prison will do that).
In any case, the heist
goes off as planned (a stash of rare coins), but Culkin throws a monkey wrench
into the works by hiding the loot and demanding some father-son time. The bulk of the film’s running time is Culkin
twisting in the knife ever deeper with more and more outrageous demands.
Bonus features included
with this Marquee Collection is a vintage “Making-of” featurette.
No comments:
Post a Comment