X
- 1993
- PG-13
- Twentieth Century Fox
- 2 h 5 m
- 1993
- PG-13
- Twentieth Century Fox
- 2 h 5 m
Summary An unemployed actor (Williams) loses custody of his children after his wife leaves him. Desperate to spend more time with the kids, the crafty thespian decides to dress up as a 60-year-old British woman and interview with his ex-wife for a nanny position. He lands the job, but he'll have to give the performance of his life to keep it. ...
Directed By: Chris Columbus
Written By: Anne Fine, Randi Mayem Singer, Leslie Dixon
- 1993
- PG-13
- Twentieth Century Fox
- 2 h 5 m
- 1993
- PG-13
- Twentieth Century Fox
- 2 h 5 m
Mrs. Doubtfire
54
8.1
Where to Watch
Summary An unemployed actor (Williams) loses custody of his children after his wife leaves him. Desperate to spend more time with the kids, the crafty thespian decides to dress up as a 60-year-old British woman and interview with his ex-wife for a nanny position. He lands the job, but he'll have to give the performance of his life to keep it. ...
Directed By: Chris Columbus
Written By: Anne Fine, Randi Mayem Singer, Leslie Dixon
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 16 Critic Reviews
54
50% Positive
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
31% Mixed
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
19% Negative
3 Reviews
3 Reviews
Metascore
Mixed or Average
Based on 16 Critic Reviews
54
50% Positive
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
31% Mixed
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
19% Negative
3 Reviews
3 Reviews
Director Chris Columbus shrewdly brings together many of the same selling points as in his "Home Alone" movies, mixing broad comedic strokes with heavy-handed messages about the magical power of family.
Williams gives an inspired comic performance. Unfortunately, he outclasses the movie, which is basically a patchwork rip-off of Tootsie.
User Score
Universal Acclaim
Based on 233 User Ratings
8.1
82% Positive
192 Ratings
192 Ratings
13% Mixed
31 Ratings
31 Ratings
4% Negative
10 Ratings
10 Ratings
User Score
Universal Acclaim
Based on 233 User Ratings
8.1
82% Positive
192 Ratings
192 Ratings
13% Mixed
31 Ratings
31 Ratings
4% Negative
10 Ratings
10 Ratings
Let me start by saying, the Metacritic "Cult" as it were, is overwhelmingly too harsh on many films. This is arguably Williams' finest role. I'm relatively new to Meta, but unless these percentage ratings are on par with a golf score (no pun intended) then the core drivers of Metacritic are simply embarrassing themselves. Lighten up. There are plenty of other ways to feed your everthirsting egos. Perhaps give "Yelp" a try.
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Mrs. Doubtfire is without a doubt one of the funniest movies ever made, as well as possibly Robin Williams' finest performance. Every frame is dripping with humor and heart, and it doesn't shy away from the emotional weight and trauma that effects a family undergoing a divorce. Sally Field also gives an incredibly underrated performance that is one of the most dynamic I have seen on the screen in a long time. Robin Williams is hilarious, absurd, crazy for his kids, and deeply vulnerable. The insanity of his plan to dress up as a 60+ year old woman his ex-wife hires as a housekeeper is hysterical. The balancing act the movie undertakes of managing all the spinning plates of a single father, a professional trying to make it in television, and a nanny is such a wonderful sight to behold. This movie is heartwarming and melancholy all at once. You're missing out if you haven't seen it.
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Most of the fun comes from seeing people fooled by what seems to us, who are in on the joke, a completely penetrable ruse. Curiously enough, what's really unpersuasive about Mrs. Doubtfire -- not to say draggy -- is its nondrag sequences.
Williams has to break out of a second-rate "Tootsie" imitation, ankles clamped in pathos and face covered in latex. He pulls it off in the end, but it's not pretty.
But the picture as a whole isn't in the class of "Tootsie" and "Some Like It Hot," mostly because its premise is sentimental, not cynical.
Now that Robin Williams has been emasculated--dangerously schizoid comic turned into nice-guy movie star--it isn't too surprising that a commercial hack like Chris Columbus would use him the way he does in this cutesy 1993 comedy: cutting between Williams trying on different voices rather than holding the camera on him as he lurches between these voices without notice.
Mrs. Doubtfire is overlong, barely funny, and a surprisingly bitter movie especially for a film aimed at children.
There are some actors who shine with their own light when put into the right environment and Robin Williams was one of those. From his long career (which was interrupted too precociously) we can count on several good films, some more famous or popular than others. However, it was through comedy that he stood out and, here, he had the whole film to show everything he could do. The result is one of the funniest and most addictive comedies I've ever had the pleasure of watching. In fact, Williams performance is the film's nerve core, supporting the action, the cast, the script, everything. The story revolves around a loving father whose professional instability prevented from maintaining partial custody of his children when divorce comes, thereby deciding to disguise himself as a woman to spend more time with his children. So we also have a beautiful and edifying moral background: the importance of family ties and paternal love. We cannot fail to observe the convincing way the makeup artists disguised Williams. The film also has the meritorious participation of Sally Field and Pierce Brosnan, in a more humorous record that is relatively unusual for the actor.
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Critics don't know what they are talking about. This film is ammmmmmmmmmmmmmmmaaaaaaaaazzzzzz
iiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnng!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Robin Williams' portrayal of Mrs. Doubtfire is one of the greatest comedic performances since the beginning of film. The film brings you through the laughs and the cries of a dysfunctional family--hitting home with each punch. It's magic!
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and logistics thin as wafer..
Mrs. Doubtfire Mrs. Doubtfire is a plot driven comic drama about a guy pushing his boundaries in order to mend his broken marriage. If the jokes are funny it's because of the comic timing of the cast, it's dramatic because of the performance and it works throughout the course of it despite of having plenty of ups and downs, because of Williams's charm that enlightens each frame. It hits few notes so correct that one gets its hopes high only to fall flatly on face so badly that it strikes down all the earned integrity up till then. In fact, its last act is so sloppy and blunt that it aches you to watch such a talent go waste by on something so redundant and juvenile. The writing gets frizzy, daft and cheesy as it ages on screen, with emotions shallow and logistics thin as wafer. The makeup designing is finely detailed, but it is short on technical aspects like typical background score, cinematography and amatuer editing. Williams is a revelation in here, his electrifying performance makes the heart pump faster and harder than ever where he is decently supported by Field. Columbus's execution still needs few better ticks and notions to nurture such a concept, either you go all sketchy and wait for the thrills and laughs or you go pragmatic and breed it sensibly and slowly to create the anticipated impact. All the husbandry gags that it is brimmed with no matter how sketchy and animated, the laughs pours out from the screen and the responsible man to contact in here is no one but Williams who is delivering some of his finest work of his career. Mrs. Doubtfire has the heart in the right place, but there factors lots of aspects in a feature than a mere concept and it is that puzzle that the makers fail to solve.
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Production Company
Twentieth Century Fox,
Blue Wolf Productions
Release Date Nov 24, 1993
Duration 2 h 5 m
Rating PG-13
Tagline She will rock your world.
Awards
Golden Globes, USA
• 2 Wins & 2 Nominations
Academy Awards, USA
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
American Comedy Awards, USA
• 1 Win & 3 Nominations
