The
Brady Bunch Movie is just one of many big screen adaptations of
beloved television shows of days gone by that recaptures the spirit of
the original show, all the while making fun of it throughout for being
dated and silly by today's standards. There is a plot, insipid and
mostly ignored for long stretches, involving a greedy real estate agent
(McKean (Memoirs of an Invisible Man,
Earth Girls Are Easy) who happens to be their next-door neighbor) who
deeply desires to see the Bradys move out so that he can cash in on a new mall to be developed for
the area. The Bradys owe $20,000 in unpaid taxes, and have a
deadline to come up with the money or be forced to leave their beloved
home.
Anyone who has seen the television show knows the basic plot. Mike Brady
(Cole, In the Line of Fire)
is a divorced father of three boys named Greg (Barnes,
"Day by Day"), Peter (Sutera, Problem Child 2), and Bobby (Soffer,
Matinee).
He meets and later marries a divorced mother, Carol (Long,
Caveman), and she brings into
their family home her three daughters, Marsha (Taylor,
The Craft), Jan (Cox, "10 Items or
Less"), and Cindy (Hack, Star Trek:
Generations). The
member of the bunch who isn't part of the family is their maid Alice
(Mantel, I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With).
The television show often captured some innocuous fun at one of the
kids' expense, usually dealing with some tribulation of being a kid,
followed by wise words from the patriarch about a valuable lesson
learned from their foibles.
The movie pretty much captures the show in terms of its spirit, its
characters, and the early 1970s fashions, but makes the characters more
one dimensional, exaggerating what they're known for to score some
satirical laughs. Marsha is ultra-vain, Jan is ultra-jealous,
Cindy is a lispy tattletale, etc. Each of them is basically just a
familiar character trait of the original cast portrayed by a lookalike
actor. Along these lines, it's fun and amusing for fans not
expecting a faithful re-enactment of the show. And though smaller
roles for RuPaul and The Monkees might seem out of place, the cameos
from the original cast will delight.
Not unlike other TV comedies that are made into big theatrical releases,
the spin on the story is that the Brady Bunch is still stuck as they
were on the television show, except living in the less groovy times of
the mid-1990s. I'm guessing that in the initial conceptual phase
for the movie, it was thought that a good source for the comedy would
come from seeing just how out of place the family would seem if they had
to deal with the metal-heads, overt sexuality, and more lurid aspects of
society outside of their sheltered, wholesome existence. If you've
ever wanted to see what the Brady Bunch might do during attempted
carjackings or lesbian come-ons, this movie explores those things and
more.
The laughs are mostly mild, playing more to the fans than it does to
typical moviegoers. Unlike the TV series, the film is PG-13 for a wide
assortment of subtle sexual innuendo that most kids may not pick up on
anyway (Mike asks visiting lothario Sam the Butcher (Graf,
Police Academy 5) what he's doing in
the house in the middle of the night: "Delivering some meat.") If
you're unfamiliar with the show, I'd say most of the jokes will fly
completely over your head, limiting the film's appeal strictly to those
who've grown up on the series, or just people who enjoy bright,
energetic, and campy comedies. But, if you're a fan, it captures
the look and sweet-natured silliness of the original show that you've
come to embrace, while also knowingly giving it a few playful jabs for
its old-fashioned attitudes that its fans also find part of its appeal.
-- Followed the next year by A Very Brady Sequel (1996) and a
made-for-TV sequel The Brady Bunch in the White House (2002)
