Riding In Cars With Boys

Movie Title: Riding In Cars With Boys
Official Website (it might still work): Riding In Cars With Boys
Rating (out of 10): 7
Reviewed By: Michael Stevens
Buy the: Video/DVD \| Soundtrack
The Review:

You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you may even gag at Drew Barrymore’s (Ever After, Home Fries) latest film, Riding In Cars With Boys. This Penny Marshall directed film is based on the memoir of Beverly D’Onofrio and is a fairly unique story, though with some rather generic themes in it. These generic themes include father/daughter relationships, mother/daughter relationships, and reconciliation.

As to the picture, the movie begins in Connecticut with young girls talking about boys and kissing. Then we get a glimpse of the life of Beverly D’Onofrio (Barrymore) as she grows up with her best friend Fay (Brittany Murphy, Girl, Interrupted). Soon we move to a formula of looking at her life through flashbacks during one day in 1986 with a mid-30s Barrymore heading off with her grown son Jason (Adam Garcia) to see her ex-husband Ray (Steve Zahn). Beverly’s life starts off normal with a bright young girl with a stable home. Plus her father (James Woods from Scary Movie 2 & True Crime) is a cop. Then she falls in love with the star football player, but the feelings aren’t mutual, as Beverly isn’t the prettiest girl at school (not that she’s ugly). This leads her down the road of finding anyone who will love her, which ends up being Ray, a decent looking moron who hangs out with the wrong kind of people. Ray then proceeds to knock up Bev (circa 1968), which pretty much ruins the life she had planned for herself. She ends up dropping out of high school, marrying Ray only because she is pregnant, and distances herself from her shamed father. The only good news for her is that Fay also becomes pregnant and drops out of school (but she came from a wealthy family and had no plans for college). Most of the rest of the film deals with the trials and tribulations of raising a kid with a drug-abusing loser, while still trying to avoid the trailer park life. Then there is the end of the story, which is mixed in with the early parts (a technique I am beginning to grow tired of) and deals mainly with mother-son issues.

Other cast members include Lorraine Bracco, Vincent Pastore, Sara Gilbert (Roseanne), and about 20 people just to play the different aged Jasons (just a bit of hyperbole).

Riding In Cars With Boys does mix the comedy and drama of Beverly’s life well. James Woods puts in another good performance as the loving dad turned ashamed, yet still helping father. Now the bad news. The film needed more laughs through the whole movie, and maybe a little more focus on the older Jason and his issues. And though the film is touching, and never takes you over the top. To conclude, an above average film that scores seven couches on the About-Movies.com scale.