Billy Crystal and Bette Midler make a compatible pair of grandparents who are so out of touch with today's kids and how they're raised that even their own daughter (Marisa Tomei) doesn't want them near her children. So it is with great trepidation that the paranoid mom allows her parents to mind the store and stay with the young ones while she and daddy go off on a long-deserved getaway. That in a nutshell is the idea behind PARENTAL GUIDANCE, and I was able to relate enough with the idea of how newer generations are missing out on what we had that I was willing to watch it. So Billy and Bette (are they not really old enough in appearance to be grandparents, or is it just that I'm not that far off from their age myself?) try to instill some of their older values and ways of life onto the kids, with occasionally funny results (the scene with Crystal and his grandson at the little league baseball game is a highlight). Nothing outstanding here, just a decent family picture that goes down pretty easy. I must be getting up there in age when I'm starting to think that Bette Midler has weathered the storm pretty well... **/12 out of ****
Review of Parental Guidance
