Man of the House is marketed as a comedy film produced during the recess summer period when Home Improvement was between seasons. Jonathan Taylor-Thomas was a principle member of Home Improvement and this is one of the films he made when he wasn't with Tim Allen. As well as Thomas, the film also features Chevy Chase, Gegroe Wendt and the late Farrah Fawcett.
The film is basically boy loses father and (later) meets stepfather, boy hates stepfather, boy tries to drive stepfather away, boy bonds with stepfather and stepfather marries boy's mother with blessing of boy. Okay so it's been done many times before in many different ways in different flavours of sheeps clothing, in this particular case the bonding is done over the Indian Guides.
Throw in some ill-conceived plot involving "bad guys" who want to kill the step-dad, a near obligatory dance-off and the presence of a mute who acts as a throwback to the old days of variety, and there's a semi-decent set of characters and story here.
Thomas behaves throughout the film in practically the same way as he did as Randy Taylor in Home Improvement, the smart-arse know-it-all kid. As a result the film can easily be looked at as either a Home Improvement location transplant or a Randy Taylor spin-off.
Normally these sort of films tend to suffer from any of the following: poor or stereotypical characterisations, irritating kids, a half-baked script in need of a rewrite or any or all of the above. None of the above apply here, except maybe for the kid with the mute and wacky dad, so it's probably excusable in that case :)
The soundtrack is fantastic for this film, as opposed to using regular random pieces of library music, this features Richard Berry, CC Music Factory and the simply fantastic Enigma's Return to Innocence which I absolutely love, cherish and adore.
Not a perfect film by any stretch of the imagination, but as another reviewer says, leave your expectations at the door and you won't be disappointed.
The film is basically boy loses father and (later) meets stepfather, boy hates stepfather, boy tries to drive stepfather away, boy bonds with stepfather and stepfather marries boy's mother with blessing of boy. Okay so it's been done many times before in many different ways in different flavours of sheeps clothing, in this particular case the bonding is done over the Indian Guides.
Throw in some ill-conceived plot involving "bad guys" who want to kill the step-dad, a near obligatory dance-off and the presence of a mute who acts as a throwback to the old days of variety, and there's a semi-decent set of characters and story here.
Thomas behaves throughout the film in practically the same way as he did as Randy Taylor in Home Improvement, the smart-arse know-it-all kid. As a result the film can easily be looked at as either a Home Improvement location transplant or a Randy Taylor spin-off.
Normally these sort of films tend to suffer from any of the following: poor or stereotypical characterisations, irritating kids, a half-baked script in need of a rewrite or any or all of the above. None of the above apply here, except maybe for the kid with the mute and wacky dad, so it's probably excusable in that case :)
The soundtrack is fantastic for this film, as opposed to using regular random pieces of library music, this features Richard Berry, CC Music Factory and the simply fantastic Enigma's Return to Innocence which I absolutely love, cherish and adore.
Not a perfect film by any stretch of the imagination, but as another reviewer says, leave your expectations at the door and you won't be disappointed.