Nicole Kidman as Brooke Harwood and Zac Efron as Chris Cole in"A Family Affair."“No great tryst ever started with someone being rational,” says the always-wise Kathy Bates as grandmother Leila Ford in’s newest rom-com, “A Family Affair.” One could argue that the same truism also applies to romantic comedies, especially the great ones.
In it, Efron plays difficult movie star Chris Cole who falls for Brooke , the mother of his 24-year-old assistant, Zara . Like the cast, the premise is promising. On its surface, the film could even be touted as a mash-up of Prime Video’s recent age-gap romance “The Idea of You” with a classic “Notting Hill”-esque twist .
In the opening scene, Zara is cursing in standstill traffic because she’s late to deliver a pair of diamond earrings to Chris, so he can break up with the latest woman he is seeing. Simultaneously, Brooke is across Los Angeles bemoaning to Bates’ character about her inability to write. Neither of these tropes play well.
This tonal inconsistency plagues the film. It also emphasizes its plot holes. For example, Chris is so famous that he’s unable to grocery shop, but he can sit in his assistant’s pediatrician office next to her and her mom who he just slept with. This is the kind of disbelief one might be able to suspend if the other components of the movie were working, but they aren’t.In"A Family Affair," Efron plays a difficult movie star who falls for the mother of his 24-year-old assistant, Zara .