A FAMILY FOR JOE
US, 1990, 95 minutes, Colour.
Robert Mitchum, Juliette Lewis, Ben Savage.
Directed by Alan Rafkin.
A Family for Joe is a pilot for a television series. Robert Mitchum is the unlikely lead - the kind of role he might have criticised strongly when he was younger.
A group of four children are left orphans when their parents are killed in the plane crash. Their neighbours are unable to look after them. The social worker wants to send them to homes. The children decide that they want to stay together, remember that they had a grandfather who had walked out on their grandmother many decades ago. They wander the town, are attacked by some thugs and defended by a man on the street. His name is Joe - and they transform him, not without his resistance, into their grandfather. In the tradition of the American sitcom, there are family tensions with the comic touch, as well as the new grandfather helping to educate the children. It is all as one might expect: lots of sentiment - but they are balanced by a lot of sardonic one-liners given to Robert Mitchum and delivered in his typical style.
Juliette Lewis was about to star in Cape Fear and Husbands and Wives and move to a movie career.
1.Entertaining sitcom? American family life? The odd couple tradition? Pilot for a series?
2.The family, the home, the city streets, schools, the courts? Audiences able to identify with the characters and their situation?
3.The title, the focus on the children, their relationship with Joe?
4.The establishing of the characters of the children: their ages, relationship, responsibilities? Their relationship with the Brewsters? The Brewsters unable to look after them? Nick and his responsibility and irresponsibility, Polly and her playing mother, Chris and his antagonism, Mary and the shock of her parents' death and her being unable to speak?
5.Miss Collins, her severe attitude? The Brewsters and their feeling helpless and guilty? The children and their decision to look for an elderly man? The comedy of their walking around and encountering hoboes? Attacked by the people in the park, Joe coming to their rescue? Their invitation to him? The explanations, the propositions and the pressure - following him, the enticement of the meal?
6.Joe, Robert Mitchum and his typical style - and his wisecracking one-liners? Balancing the sentiment? His staying, the meal, falling asleep? The room, the clothes, the bath? The children insulting him yet pleading with him? Mary and his sentimental reasons for staying? The argument with them, his life on the street? The background of the maritime service? His being briefed to meet Miss Collins?
7.The episodes with the children, his being on trial? His going to meet the teachers and being shrewd in summing up what was going on? Pressure on the children? Taking Mary to her music lesson, Holly and her antagonism, his being severe with Nick for his studies, not letting him have the job, finding the marijuana (and using the device of letting everybody smoke it if it was harmless)? The money and the bank? Chris and his earring - and Joe wearing the earring and talking to the headmaster? The court hearing - and Mary speaking and swaying the judge's attitude?
8.Joe, his background, work in the navy, his alcoholism, on the street? His job? Looking after the children well? Discipline and freedom? Their turning against him, Chris's injuries, the hospital, their relenting? The happy family?
9.Nick, age, problems, friends, the job, forging Joe's signature, the marijuana? His not working at school? Joe's discipline of him? Holly, motherly type and in charge, her resentment? Her change of heart? Chris and his being won over, support of Joe, his injuries? Mary, believing the truth about Joe - and the others not being able to disillusion her?
10.Themes of family, children being together, the blend between freedom and discipline? The old man rehabilitating himself and gaining a family? The attitudes of the social workers, the courts?
