OR

Email Address

Password

Forgot password?

The Thing About My Folks

2005

METASCORE

Mixed or average reviews based on 19 Critic Reviews

See All

48

USER SCORE

Generally favorable reviews based on 8 Ratings

See All

7.1

VOTE NOW

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

7.1	Your Score
7.1	User Score Generally favorable reviews based on 8 Ratings

Would you like to write a review?

There is a 75 character minimum for reviews. If your review contains spoilers, please check the Spoiler box. Please do not use ALL CAPS. There is no linking or other HTML allowed. Your review may be edited for content. 0/5000

Check box if your review contains spoilers

Play Sound

Please enter your birth date to watch this video:

You are not allowed to view this material at this time.

The Thing About My Folks

Now Playing: The Thing About My Folks

The Thing About My Folks

Movie Details & Credits

Picturehouse Entertainment | Release Date: September 16, 2005 | PG-13

Starring: Olympia Dukakis, Paul Reiser, Peter Falk

Summary: This hilariously truthful look at family and marriage follows a father (Falk) and son (Reiser) who set out on an impromptu road trip. (Picturehouse)

Director: Raymond De Felitta

Genre(s): Comedy

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 96 min

See All Details and Credits

Watch Now

Buy on

Stream On

Metascore

Critic Reviews

70

The Hollywood Reporter

Sheri Linden

Avoids easy shtick and saccharine conclusions, opting instead for character dynamics that the two leads deliver with consummate skill. Read full review

63

New York Post

Lou Lumenick

Director Raymond de Felitta, who directed a little-seen gem called "Two Family House" a few years ago, gives Falk plenty of room to do his thing. There's an underlying emotional truth even in scenes that seem terribly contrived. Read full review

63

Philadelphia Inquirer

Carrie Rickey

So powerful and tender are the scenes between Falk and Dukakis that by movie's end, I was wishing that the film had been more about the marriage of Sam and Muriel and less about the father and son. Read full review

50

The New York Times

Janet Maslin

Despite the grumpy, flatulent behavior the script demands of him, Mr. Falk rises above the treacly shenanigans. Read full review

50

The A.V. Club

Nathan Rabin

Flirts bravely, though gratingly, with messy, complicated emotions before ultimately drowning them in a warm bath of sticky sentimentality. Read full review

38

Chicago Tribune

Michael Phillips

Felitta and Reiser mean nothing but well with this project, but too many lines sound fraudulent, and Reiser, it must be said, is a hopeless ham in the reaction shot department. Read full review

25

The Globe and Mail (Toronto)

Liam Lacey

This one's just painful. Read full review

SEE ALL 19 REVIEWS

Write a Review

User Reviews

10

JaneR.

Sep 17, 2005

A funny,sweet,charming movie that made me laugh,chuckle,smile and cry. Peter Falk was WONDERFUL and so was Paul Riser. This one is a keeper !

0 of 0 users found this helpful

9

JimmyS

Oct 1, 2005

Those who like classic coming of age films will love this one but those who are jaded and bitter will hate it. The over 30 crowd will love it.

0 of 0 users found this helpful

9

MarcJ.

Oct 8, 2005

"The Thing About," though a bit drawn out in the middle, and laced with cute notes like Faulk's uncontrolled farting, was extremely real for me. It had some provocative turns in Reiser's and Faulk's preconceptions about the Folk's marriage relationship. My own attempt to "The Thing About," though a bit drawn out in the middle, and laced with cute notes like Faulk's uncontrolled farting, was extremely real for me. It had some provocative turns in Reiser's and Faulk's preconceptions about the Folk's marriage relationship. My own attempt to bond with my father in his last years despite the horrible years of growing up and feeling the fallout from my parents' marriage. I loved this movie while my friend thought it schmaltzy. It either resonates or it doesn't.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful

9

TomM.

Sep 25, 2006

The tension and affection, understanding and misunderstanding between all of the members of the family with a focus on the father/son relationship makes this a movie well-worth seeing more then once. Only those people who are so wounded by their own familial relationships and/or are The tension and affection, understanding and misunderstanding between all of the members of the family with a focus on the father/son relationship makes this a movie well-worth seeing more then once. Only those people who are so wounded by their own familial relationships and/or are uncaring about untangling and resolving them could fail to enjoy the healing and understanding that this story evokes.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful

8

JoAnnieB.

Feb 1, 2009

Very funny and at the same time, very touching movie. Poolhall scenes is especially funny.

0 of 0 users found this helpful

7

MarkB.

Sep 27, 2005

Comedian/writer/actor Paul Reiser is the only performer currently appearing in two movies simultaneously playing that MY folks would have thoroughly opposite opinions of. If I took them to see the gleefully obscene filthfest The Aristocrats, they'd have every reason and right to cut me Comedian/writer/actor Paul Reiser is the only performer currently appearing in two movies simultaneously playing that MY folks would have thoroughly opposite opinions of. If I took them to see the gleefully obscene filthfest The Aristocrats, they'd have every reason and right to cut me out of the will, but if I followed it up with a visit to The Thing About My Folks they'd almost surely and gladly put me right back in. Reiser, of course, was the force behind the long-running marital sitcom Mad About You, which MAD Magazine in its parody backhandedly complimented by observing that it was too often deliberately quirky and charming at the expense of being really funny. Not true; at its frequent best, Mad About You was all three, and so is this. A road movie about an elderly father (Peter Falk) and adult son (Reiser) who take a Voyage of Discovery after Falk's wife and Reiser's mom suddenly leaves Falk, it's decidedly and unashamedly middlebrow; Falk's old improvisational-verite buddy John Cassavetes is probably rolling over in his grave right now (if he didn't do so enough last year upon finding out that his wife and son respectively starred in and directed The Notebook!) But who says middlebrow viewpoints can't be perfectly valid? Reiser's script isn't especially plot-heavy--not most of the way, anyway--but he fills it with lots of delightful, sometimes surprisingly perceptive observations about fishing, small-town sports, real estate selling...there's even a little exchange about best-selling author John Grisham that says in 10 seconds all you need to know about him. Many playgoers and movie buffs are aware of "Mamet-speak", a very distinctive dialogue rhythm common to characters in David Mamet's work; this film is loaded with "Reiser-speak", a form of conversational back-and-forth in which family members, spouses and friends spend half the time finishing each other's sentences and the other half repeating what the other one just said; it's a softer, gentler variation on "Larry David-speak", and it's fun. One of the nicest aspects of this very nice movie is that it gives equal weight to the wife's (Olympia Dukakis) reason for leaving (Falk's lack of attention to her and her own lack of personal identity) and his outrage at her doing so, since as far as he was concerned he was putting in all kinds of extra hours at work to provide her with a home and everything else he thought she needed; this balance makes The Thing About My Folks a lot more emotionally honest than the tony-but-phony (if widely acclaimed) 2002 whine-o-rama The Hours, in which Julianne Moore's suicidal carping about being trapped in a 1950s marriage came across as one-sided and self-centered. The most curious aspect of The Thing About My Folks is the decision to apparently shoot most of it on digital video or something like it, wasting all that pretty scenery by giving it a blurred look, but then some of the movie's inevitable detractors would argue that it's just as well, since Reiser could just have easily written it for radio. Pay them no mind (and don't be driven out of the theater by the opening shots of a naked Falk lovingly applying baby powder to himself; it builds to a hell of a payoff); listen instead to the young woman in the film who, having never met Falk and Reiser, correctly identifies them as father and son because they look so sweet together. Precisely!… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful

SEE ALL 6 REVIEWS

More From Metacritic

What to Watch Right Now on Paramount+

Find a list of the best recent and upcoming film and TV titles added to...

What to Watch Right Now on Amazon's Prime Video

Get a list of the best movie and TV titles recently added (and coming...

What to Watch Right Now on Netflix

Get a list of the best movie and TV titles recently added (and coming...

What to Watch Right Now on Hulu

Get a list of the best movie and TV titles recently added (and coming...

Awards & Rankings

Current Movie Releases

By MetascoreBy User Score

1 81 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple

2 77 Project Hail Mary

5 72 The Sheep Detectives

SEE ALL

More From The Thing About My Folks

The Thing About My Folks

The Thing About My Folks

SEE ALL TRAILERS