Touchstone and Beyond: "My Father the Hero"

Feature Presentation: My Father the Hero

Cast of Characters:

• Gerard Depardieu as Andre
• Katherine Heigl as Nicole
• Dalton James as Ben
• Lauren Hutton as Megan

Elevator Pitch

Andre is hoping to reconnect with his fourteen-year-old daughter Nicole by taking her on Caribbean vacation. They arrive at their resort and Nicole meets Ben and wants to impress him. How Nicole does this is terribly misguided. She tells him and anyone with ears that her dad, which she calls by his first name Andre, is her older boyfriend. 

Ben likes Nicole, and as the vacation progresses the two start a relationship, all while Andre plays along as the older lover role to make his daughter happy. How long the desperate dad can play the role of elder paramour is unknown, but as he tries to help his daughter, Andre learns something about himself, and perhaps some guidance on how to fix his relationship with his girlfriend. 

The Orson Welles Award of Brilliance

The Bahamas look great, and I hope to vacation there one day.

The Alan Smithee Award of Anonymity

This is supposed to be a comedy? The idea that a father would even be willing to go along with the notion of playing the older boyfriend role to his daughter is not only disturbing, but criminal. How anyone would think that this would be a great idea which could lead to laughs and joy is beyond my comprehension. 

Katherine Heigl is fourteen years old. Her character is fourteen years old. Why on God’s green Earth would a dad allow their daughter to disappear with an unknown older guy in a foreign country and think that was okay. Also, who at Disney approved this movie and thought, yes this is what we want to attach the long history of the Disney name too. 

To make matters worse, Heigl is forced to play a character that is so overly sexualized that it is disturbing to think that this movie got made, even in 1994. How would anyone want to see their daughter in grade 8 pursuing a romantic relationship and even acting as her pimp, is something that you would see in a horror film, not a lighthearted comedy. 

I paid close attention, and I did not see anything funny in the film. 

Production Team

• Directed by Steve Miner 
• Produced by Touchstone Pictures / Cite Films / DD Productions
• Written by Gerard Lauzier / Francis Veber / Charlie Peters
• Release Date: February 4, 1994
• Domestic Box Office Gross: $25.5 million
• Worldwide Box Office Gross: $44.8 million 

I Know Their Name

Stephen Tobolowsky plays Mike, a guest at the resort. I hope Stephen enjoyed his vacation in the Bahamas.

Deep Dive Behind the Scenes

• Katherine Heigl was nominated for a Young Artist Award for her work in the film.
• Heigl was only fourteen at the time of the movie. 
• Though the island was never mentioned where Andre and Nicole go to, it’s the Bahamas, at least it must be because that’s where filming took place.
• Heigl once described in an interview how during the shooting of the film, one week Depardieu was joined by his wife and kids, then the next week after they left, his mistress with their kids would join them for a vacation.
• The film is a remake of the 1991 French comedy of the same name, which also starred Depardieu.
• Emma Thompson is not credited for her role at the end of the movie as Andre’s girlfriend. Good for you Emma, I wouldn’t take any credit for being in this movie either. 
• Heigl reportedly beat out Alicia Silverstone for the role of Nicole. Apparently, the director thought she looked more innocent in the role of Nicole instead of the seventeen-year-old Silverstone. 
• The film opened with over five and half million dollars at the weekend box office in the number four spot.
• The film features music by and appearances from the Baha Men.

Bill’s Spicy Take

Gerard Depardieu is not funny. 

Oscar Thoughts

(These rankings are awarded based on my love for Hitchcock films)

{Frenzy Award-Skip this Film, Torn Curtain Award-Desperate for Something to Watch, For the Birds-A Perfect Film for Any Device, Rear Window Award- You Must Watch This Film on a Big Screen because this film is cinema.}

Wow, where to begin. My Father the Hero is without a doubt one film that I want to wipe from my memory. I have watched many films in the last few years from the vault of Touchstone and Hollywood Pictures, and while some of them are bad, nothing has made me upset quite like this film.

Film is meant to be a place to explore and share stories from people around the world. Some of those stories are funny, some are action packed, and some are upsetting and frightening. My Father the Hero is awful. The mere concept is so disturbing, in light of what is in the public news cycle today, but what makes me so upset about this film is that the concept had to be approved by multiple executives in Disney for it to be made, and they all sat around and said, “Yeah, let’s make the movie about the old guy who pretends to date is fourteen year old daughter, and you know what, maybe we have him facilitate a relationship for his fourteen year old to an older guy in a distant country. Sounds like a laugh riot.” At least I’m sure that’s close to what was said based on my imagination.

Learning more about this film, to find out that Heigl, who was fourteen, I can’t stress this enough, was possibly chosen because she looked the best in a bathing suit, makes me want to be sick. No wonder why films need intimacy coordinators. 

My Father the Hero gets a special award which has never been issued before but will now. Since the entire film is reprehensible to me, My Father the Hero gets the Sabotage Award. This film needs to be locked away in the vault, cemented over, and forgotten.

Coming Attractions

‘Touchstone and Beyond’ will return in two weeks.