BECAUSE I SAID SO

US, 2007, 102 minutes, Colour.
Diane Keaton, Mandy Moore, Gabriel Macht, Tom Everett Scott, Lauren Graham, Piper Perabo, Stephen Collins.
Directed by Michael Lehmann.

On the whole this is a very trying experience.

If you are devoted to Diane Keaton and like anything she is in, well it is yours. The same if you like Mandy Moore. But, this is one of those family and domestic comedies where Diane Keaton gets to dominate everyone and everything – volubly, incessantly, loudly, screechingly. She did it recently in The Family Stone and this is more of the same (only more so!).

Diane is Daphne, a matriarch who has seen two daughters off in marriage but who is desperate to get her youngest, Millie, hitched. While she really is personable, in the form of Mandy Moore, she is prone to excessive chatter, has a neighing laugh and lacks all self-confidence. With a nagging and criticising mother like that, why wouldn’t she!

Daphne is not above putting an internet ad on line to vet potential suitors. Wealthy Tom Everett Scott turns up and seems the goods, though he is something of a narcissistic gourmet architect. It seems he might go for Millie. However, observing all this is musician Jack (an agreeable Gabriel Macht). He has a precocious son and an eccentric father (Stephen Collins) and he tries his hand.

Meanwhile, Daphne is celebrating her sixtieth birthday and feeling desperate about getting old – she is lucky that she has lived so long without being murdered!

Well, it all works out well with reconciliation all round and Daphne having to give up her raison d’etre, ‘Because I said so’.

1.A caricature? Realism? US families? Mothers and daughters, care, concern about marriage?

2.The Los Angeles affluent settings, homes, the city itself, the world of the architects? Venice and its canals? The celebration of events? The musical score and the songs?

3.The opening and the songs: ‘Days Like This’, the collage of mothers and daughters leading to Daphne and her daughters?

4.The two daughters and their marriage ceremonies, Millie present but awkward?

5.Daphne as a character, Diane Keaton’s performance, over the top and loud, trying? Her absent husband? Lonely, smother-love? Her continual criticism of Millie? Clothes, her laugh? Urging Millie on, putting on the pressure? Putting in the Personals ad, the collage of interviews? Johnny watching her? Her meeting with Jason, her attraction towards him, urging him on, arranging things for Millie? Following them – and driving with the dog and trying to hide? The farcical elements, the cake in her face etc?

6.Millie, her age, continued talking, her characteristic laugh, her ability at catering, her relationship with her sisters and trusting them? Her relationship with her mother, their discussions, phone calls, her tension? Jason and her going out with him, attraction, discussions, spending the night with him? Johnny turning up, the static on her dress, their discussions, outings, Johnny and the guitar lesson for the people, the contrast with Jason as the architect? Her relationship with Johnny, discovering his son, his father? Her different reactions with each of them?

7.Maggie and Mae and their lives, their marriages, the phone calls, the conference call? Maggie as the psychologist, her client, her observations about her mother, her sisters? Her husband?

8.Jason, coming to the restaurant, answering the ad, his style, food, talk about Italy? His dating Millie? His anger at her breaking the vase? His apology? His mother talking – and Millie overhearing? The break between them?

9.Johnny, watching Daphne, discussion with her, playing the guitar, his hat? His getting the information about Daphne, turning up? Going out, the guitar lesson, bringing her home, his eccentric father, Lionel and his age, telling the jokes, bumping into things?

10.Millie and her checking about the ad, discussions with her sisters, not answering her mother’s phone calls?

11.The preparation for Daphne’s 60th birthday, her attitude towards her age, her feelings, wanting Jason to be there?

12.Joe, Lionel, turning up, Daphne and her reaction, attracted to Joe, the kissing, the sexual relationship? The telling of the jokes? Their marrying?

13.Daphne and her urging Millie not to be like herself, Millie accepting herself, changing? Going to see Johnny with the guitar, his break-up with her, his anger at her relationship with Jason? His relenting, the family, the cooking, Maggie and her teaching the group, the kiss and the group applauding?

14.Maggie and her client, his going to answer the Personals ad, the sessions with Maggie, his sessions being interrupted – and the finale with the cake falling on him? His happiness?

15.American farce, loud comic style with the touch of caricature?