Mr. Movie: ‘Four Kids and It’ and ‘My Darling Vivian’

Four Kids and It

I’m not sure of the target audience of “Four Kids and It.”

The movie is about four kids unexpectedly thrust together when their two single parents announce they’ve become an item. Smash is the oldest of her kids. She’s 13ish, angry at the world, thinks her mom is a total bozo. Naturally, she idolizes her absent father.

Ros is about the same age. She and her brother live with dad. Ros isn’t angry at all even though her mom took off to college to find herself. The bookwormish Ros still believes that any day she and dad will reunite.

So the vacation at the beach is a shock and the children blend together like oil and water.

While the kids are on the beach they meet Psammead. He’s an odd looking creature who lives in the sand. Psammead can grant one wish a day and the wish starts as soon as it is expressed but ends at sunset. The animal — or whatever “it” is — warns against making wishes. He says they never turn out quite like you expect.

And they don’t.

Added to the plot is the mystery of the creep who lives in a mansion above their cottage. He has plans for the kids. What isn’t a mystery to you is how it all ties to Psammead.

Back to the film’s target. Is it younger kids? Maybe. However, Psammead isn’t all that cute and cuddly, nor even that interesting. Worse, he’s not in the movie enough, nor is there enough slapstick humor to keep them interested.

A lot of the conversation and the working things out between Smash and Ros and their parents is fairly adult. It’s been a long time since I’ve been in communication with 12 and 13-year old girls so I’m not sure how they’d react to the material. My guess is they might relate to the girls but not to the plot. It is so poorly done that they’ll be as bored as me.

Outside of no real target, the film is also horribly written. At 1:50 it comes with long, dull chunks of dialogue that really add nothing to the movie. Cut about 20-minutes and it’s more palatable. The awful dialogue also doesn’t help the young actors in the cast. You often feel like they’re just saying lines to say them. In places it seems like director Andy De Emmony was in a huge hurry and had them toss off the line or lines quickly so he could get it done on time and on budget.

Toward the end of the film when De Emmony finally gets around to the real dilemma, you learn the kids love Psammead deeply. Really? They use the poor creature, he gives them what they want and they leave until the next day when they catch him again and force him to grant a wish. Such love we can all do without.

As badly as the screenplay is for the kids, it’s brutal on Matthew Goode (“Downton Abbey”) and Paula Patton (“Warcraft”) who play the two parents and Russell Brand (2011’s “Arthur”) who plays the mansion owner. Cardboard has a better personality and more to do than these gifted actors.

The only actor having any kind of fun is Michael Caine who gives voice to Psammead. He’s wasted in a movie packed with wasted opportunities to be a pretty good flick for kids.

For a movie about a magical creature, “Four Kids and It” has very little magic.

▪ Rated PG for Mature themes. It’s streaming on various streaming sites.

▪ Rating: 1 out of 5

My Darling Vivian

I didn’t want to review this movie. The producers and the studios sent me bunches of invitations to screen Vivian Liberto Cash’s story. I declined them all. One producer contacted me personally and asked me to check it out. He was very convincing and I watched the movie. Now I can’t thank him enough.

This is an incredible story about a really incredible woman.

Most of us connect rock and country music legend Johnny Cash to June Carter Cash. She’s Cash’s second wife and — considering her status in country music royalty — Carter Cash got all the marital publicity.

The “my darling” in the movie’s title is Vivian. She’s Cash’s first wife and the mother of their four daughters. The title comes from lines written by Cash in the bunches of letters he sent to Vivian when he was in the army and before they were married. Some come from letters done on the road early in his career.

The documentary “My Darling Vivian” is about her life, their marriage, their divorce, and her life after the divorce.

With no narrator, Vivian’s story is told via pictures and video, and from interviews with their four daughters Rosanne, Tara, Kathy and Cindy. Rosanne you know from her fame as a singer. She’s the oldest and the only known entity of the group.

Vivian and Johnny’s four daughters are exceptional storytellers. You’ll smile, laugh, frown and be totally appalled at times. Much credit for how you immediately get hooked on Vivian’s story also goes to director Matt Riddlehoover.

Like the four daughters, he — also — is an exceptional storyteller and brilliantly weaves Vivian’s story together.

And that story is sad. It is also compelling. The deeper you get into her life and what happened to her, their marriage and their children, the more fascinating that story becomes.

Her personality was not one that sought the limelight. She also didn’t want to be ignored and forgotten like an old doll tossed out with a housecleaning. But as the documentary shows, and her daughters attest, that’s exactly what happened. Yet through it all Vivian, hurt as she was, was gracious and kept the hurt to herself.

That’s part of her beauty and the beauty of her story.

Best of all, the movie is not a total whine-fest. Vivian’s story has lots and lots of ups as her four daughters vividly describe her personality, sense of humor and love of life. In the film’s 90 or so minutes, I fell in love with her and with her children.

You will, too.

But like all lives, Vivian’s is not often pretty. Several scenes in Riddlehoover’s movie are shocking. The one that angered me the most is when Vivian — who admittedly loved Johnny with all her heart all of her adult life — is sitting in the audience of the TV network tribute to Cash after his death.

There’s no mention of her at all and plenty of buzz for Carter Cash. The one time she is spoken about is when Rodney Crowell — Rosanne’s ex — comes to the microphone, points her out and praises her involvement in Cash’s life. What’s shocking is that the network cut his comment out of the telecast. That’s the kind of thing Vivian endured during, and for most of her post Johnny life.

The film often mentions the Johnny Cash biopic, “Walk the Line.” It doesn’t exactly portray Vivian in a positive light. And it is the movie that leads to another sort of a slight against her legacy. When I was doing more research on the movie and grabbing information from Internet Movie Data Base (IMDB), I was shocked at how the site set the cast list for “My Darling Vivian.”

Reese Witherspoon and Joaquin Phoenix — who played Johnny and June Carter Cash in the movie “Walk the Line” — are listed first. Scroll down and Johnny is 16. June is listed 21st. Vivian is number 34 on the list.

Number 34? And he’s 16? And the movie is about her life and theirs?

The four daughters who basically narrate the movie are found below Vivian. Rosanne is 39th, Tara got placed in slot 40, Kathy is 41st and Cindy number 43. Wow. How does that happen?

Somehow it kind of fits the movie’s point that Vivian — who inspired and supported Cash’s early superstardom — was always in second fiddle. But what you find in this movie is a story of an incredible woman who just happened to be married to a superstar. Vivian raised four very lovely and loyal daughters who felt — deeply — that her story needed told.

And they told it very, very well.

Early on “My Darling Vivian” is a fascinating look at the early history of a rock and roll and modern country music legend. Then it evolves into how fame has its downside. Later, it looks intently at a wonderful, smart, fun and funny woman who endured much and did so with dignity and grace.

I always loved and respected Johnny Cash. While most of us knew about his drug addiction and struggles on the road, this movie shows a more human side of the man in black. And while it’s obvious that Vivian and Johnny’s daughters love their dad, they’re in absolute awe of their mother.

And now, so am I.

▪ Not rated. You can find the film on some streaming sites and the streaming sites of art house theaters around the country.

▪ Rating: 5 out of 5

This story was originally published July 2, 2020 at 4:38 PM with the headline "Mr. Movie: ‘Four Kids and It’ and ‘My Darling Vivian’."