CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN

REVIEWED BY CHARITY BISHOP

Our rating: 3 out of 5

Because of: crude humor, thematic elements, mild innuendo

Rated:

Twelve has always been a good number for the Baker family. Tom (Steve Martin) and Kate (Bonnie Hunt) have a wonderful but chaotic life as the parents of twelve individual little persons, including two sets of twins. Daily life on their small farm in Idaho is vastly different from anyone else. Getting the kids up, reminding Lorraine (Hillary Duff) not to spend two hours in front of the mirror, catching wayward frogs in the breakfast eggs, and reassuring the kids each of them are valued and special, takes a large chunk out of their day. But it's life... and they love it. The kids get along reasonably well together and all are happy on the farm... until dad gets the big break of his career. His old team in Chicago has noticed his coaching abilities and wants to hire him. The job comes with a six-figure paycheck, a house in the wealthy part of town, and lots of perks.

The problem? None of the kids want to move. They'd rather gouge out their eyeballs with blunt pencils than leave their beloved farm house. The promise of less hand me downs and not having to share rooms any more fails to get the anticipated response. The decision belongs to Tom and Kate and they pack up their unhappy family and move to Chicago. The neighborhood is full of snobs. The neighbors across the street won't let their only child play with the Baker kids after a terrifying experience with indoor hockey and a swinging chandelier. Charlie (Tom Welling) is mocked by the other high school kids for his secondhand car. None of his siblings are faring any better. They've come from a small town to a big city and the adjustment is difficult for everyone. Particularly for mom and dad. Tom is now expected to be on call twenty-four hours a day for the team. Kate is also going through hoops for her publishers, who want to print her book about successfully mothering twelve children.

When Kate has to go on a book tour, chaos ensues. Tom isn't able to handle eleven kids all by himself and calls in their eldest daughter Nora (Piper Perabo) for help. But the children have ulterior plans. Things will not be pretty in the Baker household until the chaos comes to a halt and the family has a genuine talk about what's truly important. Along the way will be a few good-natured pranks, some sweet moments between parents and their children, and a lot of laughs. The nice thing about Cheaper by the Dozen is how it pushes a pro-family message. That big families can be a blessing and there's enough love in a parent's heart to cover all their children, not just the "favorites." For once the father is portrayed as a good, decent, honest man who just wants to figure out how to juggle his family and career without losing out on his kids. As he tells his boss late on in the film, "If I mess up raising my kids, nothing else much matters." He also inevitably is respected by his kids. They do "talk back" a few times but even Charlie comes around to his dad's point of view and they forgive each other for their shortcomings.

If you're looking for an update of the old Myrna Loy film by the same name, you'll be disappointed. The only resemblance between the early and later versions of Cheaper by the Dozen, aside from the name, is the fact that there are still twelve children. The comic elements are better than I expected, but families should be forewarned that a few of the jokes the kids play on Nora's live-in boyfriend are crude. They trip him into the kiddy pool so they can take his underwear and soak it in meat so the family dog will attack him during dinner. Naturally the dog goes for the crotch. Noria moved out of the house because her parents wouldn't let her sleep in the same room as her boyfriend. They share an apartment together, with the parents clearly disapproving. When she is asked to baby-sit, her boyfriend stipulates they can share the same room. The answer is adamantly no, since the Baker household is "G rated."

The boyfriend sneaks in anyway and they're caught the next morning dopey-eyed in the hallway by Tom, who makes it perfectly clear their behavior is wrong and irresponsible. I would have appreciated a little more emphasis on his part to kicking her boyfriend out, but because of the pandemonium around them they got off rather light. (In the end, she realizes how selfish her lover is and chooses the kids over him.) There are a few references to sex only adults will get, minor quips by the parents about how they wound up with twelve children. None of them are particularly offensive or out of place. When Nora and her boyfriend start kissing passionately on the couch, her mother makes her get up and go into the kitchen to help prepare dinner, "look at grandma's picture, and say a rosary." Tom and Kate start kissing in front of Lorraine and she begs them to at least wait until she's left the room. There's some comical violence. A running gag involves a falling chandelier, and four of the kids get into a fight at school.

The twins, taking after their mother, intimate dad's boss is a "wiener" and "hot dog." Believing an athletic cup covered in spaghetti sauce is blood, one of the kids throws up in the kitchen. An older sibling comes at a run to help clean up, slips, and falls in it. He then also vomits. There's one profanity and a couple of mild abuses of deity. There's also a muted GD in the credits, and some humorous antics by the crew. These elements fail to overwhelm the message of family love, commitment, and responsibility. One of the children worries, while mom and dad have a rare fight, that they'll get a divorce. But it's clear from this tight-knit atmosphere such a thing would be impossible. Raising kids is not simple, but there's something touching about watching this family interact on the screen. Seeing a child run happily to his mother after running away raises the motherly feeling in even the most closed hearts. Like all films aimed at the young set, this does have a few flaws but by in large it's a touching -- albeit predictable -- look at life in the fast family lane.