Parents (1989) Vestron Pictures/Comedy-Horror RT: 82 minutes Rated R (some violence and gory images, a scene of sexuality, preteen drinking) Director: Bob Balaban Screenplay: Christopher Hawthorne Music: Jonathan Elias Cinematography: Ernest Day and Robin Vidgeon Release date: January 27, 1989 (US) Cast: Randy Quaid, Mary Beth Hurt, Sandy Dennis, Bryan Madorsky, Juno Mills-Cockell, Kathryn Grody, Deborah Rush, Graham Jarvis. Box Office: $870,532 (US)
Rating: ***
NOTE TO READERS: I’m writing this review from the perspective of the time in which it’s set. I know gender roles have changed substantially since the dark days of pre-feminism 1958. I’m not that far gone, not yet.
The dark comedy-horror Parents came out around the same time I started making regular trips to the big, bad city of Philadelphia to check out films I used to have to wait to see until they came out on video. At 21, I finally gathered up the courage to do the very thing my overprotective parents discouraged since I was old enough to show interest in seeing foreign or independent films that never made it to the suburbs. It was a huge step forward in my personal cinematic growth.
Parents came out here in the spring sometime, playing at the Roxy Screening Rooms (20th & Samson) for a single week before making way for another indie flick. The preview looked promising, but I didn’t get a chance to see it during its brief run. I had to wait until it hit video that summer to check it out. I wasn’t impressed at the time. I liked that it was weird, but it just didn’t click with me the same way Heathers and The Lair of the White Worm did. I ultimately relegated it to the recesses of my mind where it sat untouched for the next 35 years.
You all know I’m prone to rewatching movies- good, bad and everything in between- from back in the day. I’m curious to find out if I like them any better or worse than I did as a younger, less seasoned moviegoer. I’d been thinking about giving Parents another whirl for some time. I just needed to be in the right mood at the right time. The two things synched up perfectly this past Saturday night.
Some movies are lost classics. That’s not how I’d describe Parents. It’s definitely more interesting than I remember it being, but director Bob Balaban (yes, the actor from all the Christopher Guest mockumentaries!) has a hard time bringing it all together. I do like the idea behind it though. It’s actually quite brilliant what the first-time feature filmmaker is going for. And what might that be? Read on, readers!
Balaban, working from a script by Christopher Hawthorne, taps into the hidden fears all children have of their parents. As little kids, what do they really know about the adults tasked with taking care of them? They go by “Dad” and “Mom”. He goes to “work” everyday. She takes care of the house and cooks the meals. Their word is law; what they say goes. Who are they really? What really goes on after the kids go to bed? What if they’re up to no good? What if they’re really monsters, aliens or something worse? Are they keeping secrets? What’s with the funny looks they exchange before answering a question? What if they’re plotting against you in some way? These are the thoughts that keep kids awake at night.
Set in 1958, Parents centers on the picture-perfect nuclear Laemle family- Dad (Quaid, National Lampoon’s Vacation), Mom (Hurt, The World According to Garp) and 10YO Michael (Madorsky in his sole acting credit). They’ve just moved to an idyllic suburban neighborhood in California to begin a new chapter in their life. On the surface, all seems fairly normal except it’s really not. There’s something bothering Michael, something he can’t or won’t put into words. He’s definitely afraid of something having to do with his parents, but what? His odd behavior concerns his teacher (Grody, My Bodyguard) enough that she brings in a social worker, Millie Dew (Dennis, 976-EVIL), to assess him. He won’t open up to her at first, but things eventually reach the point where he’s too scared to not tell somebody of the potential danger he might be in at home.
There’s definitely something off about Michael’s parents. It’s like they’re making an extra effort to seem normal, putting a lot of energy into maintaining a façade of familial perfection. Dad, in his horn-rimmed glasses and dorky clothes, relates to his son in a way that suggests something sinister lurks beneath the surface. When the boy steps out of line, Dad always has a story with a lesson at the ready. He tells it in a calm but threatening manner that would rattle the most stoic kid. Mom, looking like the Stepford version of June Cleaver, spends all day in the kitchen preparing meals for her hungry men. She’s an oblivious sort, content to smile and act like nothing’s wrong. She shows all the classic signs of an abused wife. The parents have this thing about meat. There’s always plenty of it on hand and they’re forever trying to get Michael to eat his. He won’t touch it. He knows something isn’t kosher. He’s right.
The one scene from Parents that always stuck with me was an exchange at the dinner table between Michael and his folks. It perfectly illustrates the parents’ tendency to evade and deflect with jokes when confronted with questions they don’t want to answer truthfully:
Michael: “What are we eating?”
Mom: “Leftovers, honey.”
Michael: “Leftovers from what?”
Mom: “From the refrigerator.”
Michael: “We’ve had leftovers every day since we moved here. I’d like to know what they were before they were leftovers.”
Dad: “Before that, they were…. leftovers to be.”
CLASSIC PARENTAL DODGE! It speaks to the way parents keep kids in the dark when dealing with an uncomfortable truth. And that truth is…… Mom and Dad really are monsters…. in a sense. They’re cannibals. Is it any wonder they can’t accept the possibility of their only child being a vegetarian?
It’s hard to categorize Parents. It’s never just one thing. It’s black comedy, social satire and grisly horror awkwardly rolled into one. Balaban, whose directorial credits include the teen zombie comedy My Boyfriend’s Back (1993) and the overlooked drama The Last Good Time (1994), struggles with balancing the three things. It’s noticeably uneven in tone which, oddly enough, works in the film’s favor in that it enhances its inherent strangeness. Call it a happy accident, I guess.
The performances are spot-on primarily because the actors understand what they’ve gotten themselves into with Parents. They get how truly warped it is and act accordingly. Quaid strikes a deft blend of Ward Cleaver and John List while Hurt nails the role of the happy housewife. She’d be the ideal commercial spokeswoman for amphetamines. Madorsky left the limelight after just one movie. He went on to a career in accounting. Should he have stuck with acting? Who’s to say? He’s pretty good in Parents though. He crushes it as the weird kid in class whose only friend is the weird girl (Cockell, Prom Night III: The Last Kiss) who claims to be from the moon. Dennis has some good scenes as the somewhat off-center social worker who, in typical 50s fashion, doesn’t think twice about smoking around kids.
I laughed a few times during Parents. The chemical company where Dad works is called Toxico. That one gave me a fit of the giggles as did the nerdy boss (Jarvis, Mr. Mom) who talks to Michael like he’s narrating one of those dull educational films they show in school. Unfortunately, the movie is never fall-down hilarious or OTT gory. Balaban should have leaned into the comedy and horror more than he does. A nutty flick like Parents needs to be outrageous. It’s a little too restrained for its own good. That’s too bad, the potential for a great cult flick is right there. It misses by that much. Even so, it’s still weird enough for the folks who dig that sort of that thing.
