{"id":6785,"date":"2024-10-25T11:14:56","date_gmt":"2024-10-25T15:14:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=6785"},"modified":"2024-10-25T11:14:56","modified_gmt":"2024-10-25T15:14:56","slug":"made-in-america","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/10\/25\/made-in-america\/","title":{"rendered":"Made in America"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Made in America<\/strong> (1993)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 111 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (thematic material, sexual situations, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Richard Benjamin\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Marcia Brandwynne, Nadine Schiff and Holly Goldberg Sloan\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Mark Isham\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0Cinematography: Ralf Bode\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 28, 1993 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Whoopi Goldberg, Ted Danson, Nia Long, Will Smith, Paul Rodriguez, Jennifer Tilly, Peggy Rea, Clyde Kusatsu, David Bowe, Jeff Joseph, Rawley Valverde, Fred Mancuso, Charlene Fernetz, Shawn Levy, Lu Leonard, Phyllis Avery, Frances Bergen.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $44.9M (US)\/$104.9M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u00a0What\u2019s worse than finding out you\u2019re the product of artificial insemination? How about finding out your biological dad is the most obnoxious guy in town? What, not bad enough? Okay, how about this? What if you\u2019re a black teen and the obnoxious guy is white? How do you break the news to your mother, a proud black woman who specifically requested the sperm donor be a black man? Now what if said black woman is Whoopi Goldberg? It\u2019s safe to say all hell\u2019s going to break loose.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s also the premise of Made in America<\/strong>, a comedy with more heart than one would expect from a movie dealing with sperm banks. It came out not long after Frozen Assets, another sperm bank comedy starring a Cheers cast member- i.e. Shelley Long. I still feel icky from watching it and that was more than 20 years ago. Ted Danson (Three Men and a Baby) co-stars alongside then-girlfriend Goldberg as Hal Jackson, the cowpoke owner of a car dealership who regularly makes an ass of himself on late night TV commercials that usually involve animals like chimps, bears and elephants. The last thing he wants is a family much less one he didn\u2019t even know he had. That\u2019s the dilemma he faces when Zora (Long, Friday) confronts him at his workplace while he\u2019s making another idiotic commercial.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Wait a minute, let\u2019s hit the brakes. I\u2019m getting ahead of myself here. I should start from the beginning, shouldn\u2019t I? Zora is the only child of Sarah Matthews (Goldberg, Ghost), the carefree owner of an African-American bookstore who throws caution out the window every day when she rides her bike to and from work. She weaves around and cuts in front of cars, trucks and buses like she\u2019s impervious to injury or death.<\/p>\n

\u00a0One day at school, Zora takes a blood test that reveals the man she thought was her father couldn\u2019t possibly be. Blood types never lie, right? After getting little information from her mother, she goes to the sperm bank and breaks into the computer to get a name. How does she pull off this daring heist? Why, by tricking her best friend Tea Cake (Smith, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) into posing as a donor to distract the head nurse. It works, of course.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Okay, we\u2019re all up to speed now. Hal freaks out when Zora hits him with the big news sending the teen home in tears. When she breaks the news at home, Mom doesn\u2019t just hit the roof, she goes right through it. She\u2019s wild pissed the facility tricked her. She\u2019s also mad as hell at Hal for hurting her daughter. She lets him know this in no uncertain terms. She also informs him that they don\u2019t need or want him in their life regardless of his…. shall we say, contribution. Of course, you know Hal and Sarah will both experience a change of heart as well as fall for each other despite their differences.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Whoopi did Made in America<\/strong> between the two Sister Act movies. It came out in early summer \u201993 the same weekend (Memorial Day) as Cliffhanger and Super Mario Bros. The studio obviously expected it to be a huge hit which it was not making nearly $100 million less than Sister Act. It\u2019s not as fall-down funny as the nun comedy, but it still has a fair share of laughs.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Whoopi is a naturally funny lady who also carries herself with dignity, a commodity in short supply in most comedies- e.g. Frozen Assets. She has this directness that allows her to respond to each and every situation at hand whether it\u2019s dealing with a distraught daughter or being chased through the streets by a rogue elephant. It also allows her to convey her fear of her changing feelings towards Hal as he steps up in his new role as father.<\/p>\n

\u00a0For his part, Danson gives a solid performance as a guy who starts off as an unlikable cad, the kind of fellow who lives with a WAY-too-young girlfriend (Tilly, Moving Violations), before changing into a nice guy who truly wants to be there for his daughter. He has a few goofy moments, mostly involving his animal co-stars, as well as some tender moments with his new family.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Smith provides ample support as the movie\u2019s comic wild card. He has a way with dialogue like when Hal comes to Sarah\u2019s home, \u201cThere\u2019s a white man at the door.\u201d He\u2019s just funny; I can\u2019t put it more succinctly than that. Long is also quite good as Zora, an intelligent high school senior up for a huge science scholarship.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Predictably, there\u2019s a health crisis in the final act that will reveal a surprise that most will see coming. Casting aside its obviousness as a dramatic gimmick, it works in spite of that. Call me a sucker, but damned if Made in America<\/strong> didn\u2019t put a smile on my face. Sure, some of it feels a bit labored. The whole subplot about Tilly\u2019s airhead character feels shoehorned in. Another subplot, Zora becoming involved with a lothario employee of Hal\u2019s, is dropped altogether. The relationship between Zora and Tea Cake, friends since childhood, is sweet.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In fact, sweet is just the right word to describe Made in America<\/strong>. Directed by Richard Benjamin (My Favorite Year), it strikes almost the right balance of funny and heartwarming. Despite its subject matter, it doesn\u2019t fall back on crude humor- save for the Tea Cake\u2019s scene at the sperm bank- for laughs. I\u2019ll always take heart over jizz jokes.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Made in America (1993)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Warner Bros.\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 111 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (thematic material, sexual situations, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Richard Benjamin\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Marcia Brandwynne, Nadine Schiff and Holly Goldberg Sloan\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Mark Isham\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0Cinematography: Ralf Bode\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 28, 1993 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Whoopi Goldberg, Ted Danson, Nia Long, Will Smith, Paul Rodriguez, Jennifer Tilly, Peggy Rea, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7208,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Made-in-America-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6785"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7210,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6785\/revisions\/7210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}