The New York critics are going all “Irreviews” on this one, pulling out the big guns to obliterate this film, but it’s really not called for. Sure it’s a bad film, but it’s bad in a very conventional and boring sort of way, nothing worth getting your panties in a twist over. Although its heart was in the right place, the kid is cute, Jennifer Garner works hard, and they clearly tried to make it an endearing story, it is nevertheless completely ill-conceived and nothing in it works – this is not an infrequent occurrence in Hollywood.

My wife and I agreed that the film might have (with considerable additional effort invested) been okay had they not relied on the device of the parents’ interview as a kind of narration to tell you things that should have been handled in the dialog; this hurt the film immensely. But we then also agreed that this unfortunate device felt a bit like an add-on, almost as if they tried to tell the story straight, failed, and then filmed the interview sequences afterward and re-cut the film, in a desperate attempt to salvage it. I don’t know if this is true or not, but the important thing is that the movie feels like it could easily be true.

This film left a bad taste in my mouth. My recommendation is to avoid it. But don’t get the idea that it’s the worst film of the year, or anything like that.