She's Having a Baby (1988)

'She's Having a Baby' is an interesting exercise in the oldest most simple kind of story hendered by stupid gimmicky side-plots that pull it down like dead weight.At the center is a pure, honest, likable couple played by Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth McGovern. There aren't two more winning personalities in the movies. Bacon has a strong presence and a good personality. The Invaluable Elizabeth McGovern has one of the most honest faces that I have seen in a movie. When she says she loves him, she has a certain way of holding herself that leaves absolutely no doubts in my mind.The movie tracks the progression of their first years of marriage from the wedding to their first child. We meet them on their wedding day where Bacon (like the groom in almost every movie) is a sweating, nervous wreck fearful that he is giving up his freedom.They move into a condo that is more mortgage then home. Bacon gets a low-level job with an ad agency and after a few years the rest of the family hints that it might be time to have a baby. So, the rest of the movie shows their efforts at conception.This is all well and good and if the movie had stayed with the simple plot detail that I just described, this would have been a better movie. The problem is that it keeps throwing in a lot of distracting, unnecessary plot baggage. For example, after the two move to the suburbs, they are surrounded by the usual gallery of suburbanites including the men who are more interested in their lawn mowers then their wives and wives discuss their husband as if they were children. This all culminates in a stupid Busby Berkly-type dance sequence involving lawnmowers.Clichéd characters abound in this film including McGovern's parents who absolutely hate their daughter's new husband and bad mouth him at every turn. Another cliché: Bacon's best friend played by Alec Baldwin keeps hitting on McGovern while Bacon keeps having fantasies about the same beautiful woman and begins to have longings for his bachelor freedom.On top of all of that, there are silly fantasy moments as when Bacon finds out that McGovern is pregnant and envisions himself being hurled screaming toward a brick wall. Or the moment when they get married and the minister reads off a laundry list of duties that Bacon is to perform in order to make her happy. Or the typical panic-stricken tailspin that Bacon goes into when McGovern goes into labor.This is a case of less is more. I liked the quiet moments in this movie which are wedged in between the gimmicks. The small romantic moment between the couple are very sweet and touching. Because these two actors are masters of emotional depth I had no trouble believing that their were honestly and passionately in love.The movie ends with one of the most emotional scenes I can remember. A complication arises when McGovern goes into labor and Bacon sits in the waiting room. The scene is done so beautifully that I longed for what the rest of the film could have been if it weren't trying so hard to be cute. 'She's Having a Baby' could have been an effective movie had the director had the nerve to trim the fat.

I feel like the point of the film, the morals learned and the entire narrative structure is lost on most.The film is the REtelling of a man (Kevin Bacon) and his immaturity to his marriage and refusal to grow up. The weird dream sequences show this visually and since it's being told to us, these represent exactly what he felt at the time. We never see his happy moments that are only revealed in the finale because at the time, he didn't notice them so we are denied them to be put in his shoes. It can be confusing the first time you watch it may feel kind of disjointed but it makes sense in the end.Because the film was created this way, the montage in the final moments is heart wrenching as we see Bacon go trough his transformation and realization.This was Hughes' attempt to break out of his brat pack films into serious drama and while I wouldn't say it's award worthy, it's easily one of his best films and most certainly his most underrated.

This is definitely not John Hughes' genre. In his attempt to tackle this weighty subject, he has created a flippant, misfired show about life-time commitments. Hughes just can't stay serious about serious. There is not enough humour in here to make this a successful comedy, and the poignancy at crucial points is missing (so much potential in this area). Too many scenes shoot wide of the mark.Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth McGovern are both likable and they make a cute couple, but the former has gone on to stronger roles and the latter; whatever did happen to Elizabeth McGovern?Chicago is of course the setting, and Hughes employs the usual pop soundtrack (from former "Police" guitarist Stewart Copeland).PS Stay tuned for the end credits when a crowd of Hughes' friends drop by.Monday, January 26, 1998 - Video

...Would be a more fitting title for this movie. And I really liked the movie. It just wasn't about a baby, and it wasn't about his wife. She's a secondary character, if that. It's all about Kevin Bacon's character who is a ad-man who wants to be a professional writer, but his wife, and the beautiful home in the suburbs and all its dreary perfection, is bringing him down. As are his in-laws, his player best buddy (Alec Baldwin in his thin days), and a dream-girl who seemingly wants to seduce him. This film is really about the struggle and the temptation of a guy who has everything, but doesn't know if he wants it. There are some incredible, creative scenes. One showing how his office literally closing in on him; another showing a picture of his father-in-law smiling as he's looking at it; then he says something to the picture (as if speaking to it) and the picture has changed to where the father-in-law has a shocked expression. There's one homage to "Psycho" where the wife throws "the pill" down the drain; you get a shot of the water going down the drain which then slowly dissolves to her eye. And there's a musical sequence with suburbanites mowing their lawns whilst dancing and singing that is hilarious when taken in its context; but if you were to see this sequence out of context, you'd think it's gonna be a horrible film. Anyhow, this movie is all about the husband. They show the wife having the baby at the very end, and things get complicated and that's when he realizes how much he loves her... brooding in the waiting room like the character from Hemingway's "A Farewell to Arms". But you really don't feel that he ever really loved her in the first place. That's the only fault I can give this film. The rest of it is creative and totally entertaining.