It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Blistering performances.

Kristy (Elizabeth McGovern) and Jake Briggs (Kevin Bacon) have doubts getting married. His best friend Davis McDonald (Alec Baldwin) offers to drive his getaway. Instead of a honeymoon, Kristy insists on Jake finishing his degree. The student living in New Mexico does not go well. They leave to return to Chicago. They struggle with unsatisfying jobs, and meddling in-laws. They get a house with a mortgage. He starts to write. Davis belittles his suburban married life.Filmmaker John Hughes tries to extend his range into twenty somethings married couple. There is something missing. The comedy feels too broad. The characters feel one-dimensional. There are a couple of funny moments. It does need to decide on how serious or how ridiculous this movie is suppose to be playing at. There are many dream sequences. The neighborhood lawnmower dance is stupid and the nightclub seductress is serious. They shouldn't be in the same movie together. Bacon is a little too self-obsessed and McGovern is a little too reserved. They're fine actors but their characters are rarely in a loving tone. They start scared and it's one long struggle. This movie holds some truths but it's somehow not profound like it wants to be.

Seeing this movie again after several years, really showed me what a lovely uncomplicated experience it was. Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth McGovern were perfect choices for the roles of new Husband and Wife, not helped at all by the treacherous Alec Baldwin. The story was interesting all the way through to the very end, and we had fun, pathos and love all wrapped into 90 minutes or so, but I felt Kevin Bacon carried the film, and showed even in those early days of his career the great potential that eventually became real in his "Mystic River" performance, as well as others like "The River Wild", etc. I cannot understand why it did not do much better at the Box Office.

After watching "Curly Sue" just a few days ago, "She's Having a Baby" was the only film directed by the late John Hughes which I had not yet seen. This is another one written, directed, and produced by Hughes. I still haven't seen every film he ever wrote/produced, but have now seen all eight of the ones a directed in his career. Most of them I've found to be at least pretty good, some of them more than that, and when I finally watched "Curly Sue", I found that it usually fails in its attempts to be funny, but does have some fairly gripping drama. Like that film, I wasn't expecting this one to be that great, since it's another one of Hughes' less popular efforts. However, I certainly was expecting it to be better than it turned out to be! Jake and Kristy Briggs are two young newlyweds, and after they get married, they move to New Mexico, where Jake studies to get a Masters Degree at graduate school, but he really doesn't like this, so he gives up before he reaches his goal. After this, the two of them move back to Chicago, where Jake manages to get a job as an advertising copywriter, after failing to fool his employers with his thoroughly dishonest resume, but still impressing them with it. While working at this job, he also aspires to become a writer. Kristy finds employment as a research analyst. With their combined income, Jake and Kristy are able to afford a sizeable house in the suburbs of Chicago. Unfortunately, their marriage is turning out to be a dysfunctional one. A lot gets in their way, including trouble with Jake and his father-in-law, Russ Bainbridge, and also a visit from Jake's old friend, Davis McDonald, who comes with an unloving sexual partner! As time goes by, Jake and Kristy eventually face problems of a different sort.Pretty much all aspects of this movie I didn't care for, including the bland characters and the performances from the cast members who play them. Alec Baldwin as Davis McDonald might be the worst, but nobody really stands out. Kevin Bacon is no exception as Jake Briggs, and this character's narration isn't very impressive. Since this is supposed to be a comedy, I guess the main problem is the lack of laughs. I did laugh a little at times, the job interview for instance, but the humour definitely more often fails than succeeds, and nothing is hilarious here. I especially didn't care for the part where Jake is laughed at by everyone in the waiting room. As well as laughs, John Hughes was known to have poignancy in his films, and there definitely are moments in this one that are supposed by be poignant, but they failed to grab me. It's not a very well written story, and watching this miserable marriage at different points through the years did not show me any reason why it should keep going. Eventually, I found that the film was getting a little frustrating to sit through, as it was pretty tedious.John Hughes wrote and produced more than he directed in his film career, but of the eight movies he wrote AND directed (most of which he produced as well), many viewers might say that "Curly Sue" is the weakest. However, after watching "She's Having a Baby", I disagree. His 1991 film may be inferior to most of the other films in his directing credits, but I would say it is at least superior to this 1988 effort, even if that's not the most popular opinion. Also, of all the films Hughes directed, this was the second one in which the protagonists were not high school students, the first of those being "Planes, Trains & Automobiles", starring John Candy and Steve Martin. That film is both hilarious and heartwarming, with outstanding characters and cast performances, but this one doesn't have any of those qualities. It basically seemed like the opposite of its predecessor to me in more than one way, as it is overall bland, bleak, unfunny, and listless, without any very notable characters/performances. With the way it made me feel, I cannot question why this movie doesn't get as much recognition as a number of other pictures which Hughes made in the same decade as this one.

...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.