The Screen Addict | Parenthood

When the work of a particular filmmaker captivates me, I want to see and own everything they’ve made. I am a completist, so I obsessively need to collect their entire oeuvre – even the lesser stuff.

I have been a huge Ron Howard fan from the moment I saw Willow (1988) on a bootleg VHS-tape when I was about 10 years old, and have since seen, loved and purchased almost every film the director has made.

I say almost, because I am very ashamed to admit there has been a huge blind spot in my appreciation of Howard’s work for far too long – Parenthood (1989).

I don’t know why I never bothered to rent Parenthood or catch it on television. Maybe because when I started to discover Howard, I was more into Action and Spectacle, so I was focused on stuff like Backdraft (1991), Apollo 13 (1995) and Ransom (1996).

But then again – I never shied away from Family films and I absolutely love Steve Martin. Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987) – which ticks both boxes – is one of my all-time favorites.

So why did I ignore Parenthood? Again – I have no real excuse. Last night however, I corrected this unjust omission in my Howard Homework.

What a fool I’ve been. This film is an incredibly rich, funny, brutally honest slice of life. A couple of jokes haven’t aged well, but let’s just say it was a simpler time back in 1989. Screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel worked with Howard on many projects since the three met on the set of Happy Days, and the shorthand really shows.

Cynics will say that the overall optimistic message is unrealistic because they believe that basically – life sucks. But hey, that’s why they’re cynics. I want to believe that life is beautiful, and raising children is the highest achievement to strive for.

I can write pages and pages about the incredible Parenthood cast, but suffice it to say that any film that has Joaquin Phoenix and Keanu Reeves playing brothers-in-law is worth checking out.

Two decades after the feature version of Parenthood, the world created by Howard, Ganz and Mandel continued to evolve in the shape of a TV Series. It ran for six seasons with huge commercial and critical success, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see one of the streamers rebooting the show one of these days.

Until then, look up this beautiful film and give it some love.

Solid recommend.

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Twitter (X): Robin Logjes | The Screen Addict