Highly Overrated But Still Good

Beautiful, moving film.

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

I wanted to like "The Family Jewels" but found there was more to it to dislike than like. It's really a shame, as some aspects of the film were quite good--but too much of it suffered from extreme overacting.The film begins with a very rich little girl being told by lawyers that her father's will stipulates that she must move in with one of her five uncles. So, the plan is for her to visit each uncle and spend a couple weeks with each of them--and then she gets to choose the one she'll live with for the rest of her life. The uncles, it turns out, are all played by Jerry Lewis. And, oddly, their unrelated chauffeur also is played by Jerry. So, in many ways the film is reminiscent of such comedies as "Kind Hearts and Coronets", "The Mouse That Roared" and "The Klumps".There were some parts of the film I liked. A few of the jokes (a distinct minority) were funny and I caught myself laughing a couple times. Additionally, I liked watching the relationship between the chauffeur and the child--showing what I've thought for a long time--that Lewis was EXCELLENT at drama and I wish the film had more of that. But, too often the characters were done with no subtlety and although many reviewers love him, I found much of the antics overbearing and overdone. Subtle, it ain't! It's a shame, as I do like some of Lewis' films--but others just needed less--a lot less.

I've rated this movie a ten - why? For one it's fun to watch - teaches a great lesson when having kids watch with you. Jerry Lewis was a great father and was always good with kids! The acting, slap stick isn't quite up today's standards of 'horror' 'bloodshed' or 'sex' but it's so much better than any of them on the big screen. One you don't have to worry about a scene slipped in or words you don't use and don't care to hear in public or private. This movie came out as I was returning from Africa for my final duty station in the US. When I went to the Far East in 1963 - we appeared to have a sane country - when I came back it was to nudity, sexual gradification, drugs and race riots. Then going to Africa - if possible the society got worse - aiding and abetting the enemy by protests which even today make a pale comparison to some. Jerry Lewis was an exception to this - reminding us of values and morals. chuck

And now I would like to write an objective review of the movie for you--but I don't have time. Just watch it. I thought it was fascinating and funny. I hadn't seen it since 1965 when it was at the theaters, maybe it was kept off tv because experts didn't like it. But make up your own mind, one that isn't closed from the beginning because of analysis or psychoanalysis by someone else. There are two great pool shots that you definitely need to see, and the part where Jerry Lewis was talking like Pee Wee Herman way back in 1965 was also interesting. I think there's a lot more to the movie than these two things though.

One has nearly always gotten the impression from watching the antics of Mr. Lewis that the humor is being undermined by a fatal egotism which knows no reasonable or acceptable boundaries. 1965's The Family Jewels marks the beginning of Lewis' long decline--his wish to play seven roles, far from constituting a bravura tour de force, is simply a sign of his nauseating hubris and megalomania. What better way to dominate the proceedings and garner all the attention for oneself than to occupy seven of the eight principal roles? Also, Lewis at this stage is teetering indecisively between being a director of kiddie flicks and turning out films designed to appeal (or at least be tolerated by) a mature audience. Here he fails dismally. The kiddie humor is mostly forced; the adult content betrays Lewis' all-consuming flaws of cloying sentimentality, self-righteousness, and hackneyed plot devices. You KNOW the little girl will pick the chauffeur to be her "father," you KNOW the foppish Brit will turn out to be a pool shark, the thug will have a heart of gold, etc. I get the impression that it is at about this point Mr. Lewis should have sought long-term psychotherapy so that he could have combatted the inner demons built up during the course of his (admittedly harrowing) childhood. Even at the self-expressed risk of losing his sense of humor, this move would have been cost-effective--his film previous to this, The Disorderly Orderly, was, in many respects, his last hurrah. Sadly, The Family Jewels (note the smirkingly referential title; note the poster in which a cloyingly "cute" moppet with a soft fuzzy beret is surrounded by seven phallic Jerry Lewises) deserves its reputation as a flop. But at least it's a very interesting case study.