COLUMN: ‘Riding in Cars’ is a forced drive
I remember when I first learned that Penny Marshall, who I knew as Laverne on Laverne & Shirley, had directed Big, the story of a boy who wished to be more than he was and ended up getting much more than he bargained for. Marshall’s works since Big include Awakenings, A League of Their Own, and The Preacher’s Wife.
Marshall’s latest piece of directing comes in the form of the film Riding in Cars with Boys, a story that follows the life of Beverly D’Onofrio, played by Drew Barrymore (Charlie’s Angels, Never Been Kissed), whose dreams of love and success continually dead end as the men in her life prove to be her largest obstacles and also her richest source of joy.
Although this film portrays the plight of teenaged boys and girls that get pregnant in high school and get married pretty realistically and the acting is done fairly well, there are many problems with the way the movie is put together.
Much of the dialogue in the film feels forced as if the writer had a couple of great lines he wanted the characters to say and then filled the parts in between as best he could.
A great deal of the music in the film was extremely good, but out of place. There is a scene where an older and mature Beverly D’Onofrio is riding in the car with her son.
The scene is awkward as mother and son struggle to connect or even know what to say to each other and in the background the radio is playing upbeat, ’80s tunes like Cyndi Lauper’s Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.
There may have been an underlying tone to this choice, but it made the scene feel out of place, where it should have enhanced the scene and made it more palatable.
The whole film follows much the same path, and has many seams that cause the viewers to become distracted, which in my case led to boredom.
Other characters in the film were played by James Woods (Any Given Sunday), Brittany Murphy (Don’t Say a Word), Steve Zahn (Saving Silverman) and Sara Gilbert (High Fidelity).
The brightest part of this film came in the form of Cody and Logan Arens, who played D’Onofrio’s son, Jason, at ages three and six respectively. The acting of these boys was often better than the adults around them, mixing well delivered dialogue with adorable and perfect expressions.
I do not believe this movie is up to par with Penny Marshall’s previous work and would not suggest you catch a ride or even drive yourself to the theater to watch this film.
Grade C-