My Father the Hero (1994)

People are voting emotionally.

Too much about the plot just didn't add up, the writing was bad, some of the scenes were cringey and awkward,

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

This is a wonderful movie completely missed by the critics. It is amazing, reading the reviews. Roger Ebert, the dean of the tribe, complains about a scene that looks fake, failing to be aware of the role of lying in the movie and in this scene.What is especially nice is how tastefully the movie skirts a very dangerous area so gracefully. Funny, charming, and touching. What more do you want?My only complaint is that certain important points come a bit too late, but this is a quibble.

Nicole (Katherine Heigl) is a 15 year old living with her divorced mother in Manhattan. She is forced to go on vacation with her French father Andre (Gérard Depardieu). She insists on calling him Andre. She hates being in an old people's resort in The Bahamas. She falls for local Ben (Dalton James). To make herself look more mature, she tells him that she's 16 and a secret mistress to Andre while pretending to be his daughter. A rumor of their disturbing relationship soon spreads throughout the resort. Nicole keeps adding to her tall tale.Katherine Heigl started to be hot as an underage teen. Sometimes that got played up in her early movies. This one shines a bright spotlight on the issue. Dalton James looks a lot older than his character who is suppose to be 17. The whole underage issue is awkward and keeps any comedy from being funny. Gérard Depardieu may be funny to the French but he is not that funny in English. There is no way his flailing around could overcome the movie's inherent awkwardness. When he starts going with the lie, it turns from bad to annoyingly stupid.

This movie, to me, is comfort food to my soul. I can't explain it. It's not an Oscar worthy picture, but there's a certain type of sweetness at the core of this movie, that seems to reach out and grab you. It's one of those movies that you break out and watch while you eat a quart of ice cream and cry over a long, tiring day. And somehow the movie manages to reach you. Maybe it's the way each character interacts. Or the wonderful island music that kind of takes you away. It has an innocence that touches you. A charm that many movies have lost. Maybe because it's such a simple story, it's not trying to hard to disarm you, so you get to enjoy the entire thing for exactly what it is. A cute, simplistic, coming of age romance. Three thumbs up ;]

Having not seen her father for ages, fourteen year old Nicole has become a young woman when her father Andre comes to New York to take her away on a beach holiday. Nicole is embarrassed by her father and is struggling with being a woman and a girl at the same time. Keen not to appear childish in front of hunky Ben, Nicole tells him she is 16 and pretends her "father" is actually her lover. The plan convinces Ben of her age but when the story gets around that the much older Andre is having sex with a 16 year old, it causes problems at the resort.Although it took me quite a long time to get over the idea of a comedy revolving around the early sexual blooming of a 14 year old wearing a thong bathing suit, I eventually did and once I had all that was left was a rather bland comedy that had quite few laughs or moments of interest. The plot is in two basic threads. In one the annoying and totally undesirable Nicole tries to get Ben to fall for her. In the other Andre suffers because of unknowingly being taken for his own daughter's sugar daddy. Neither thread works at all well and the result is a mostly bland concoction that didn't interest me at all. The direction is suitable nondescript and does nothing with it.The cast can't lift the material and mostly are just so-so. Without any charm in the script, Depardieu just seems clunky. He has very little charisma with Heigl although that isn't all her fault. She only has two modes – one is forcing her looks, the other is being petulant and spoilt. It does nothing to help make the material interesting or charming and she isn't any good. Support is average from James and others as the story is not good enough to give them anything to work with and there is nothing else for them to do.Overall this is a bland comedy that may appeal to teenage girls with the giggles but it did nothing for me. The material lacks charm and the cast just plod their way through it. Even ignoring the uncomfortable idea of the 14 year old girl pretending to be sexually active with a man in his late 40's this still is a strange and unfunny film.