The Family Stone

Dermot Mulroney brings his uptight, upper-crust girlfriend (played by Sarah Jessica Parker) to his tight-knit, liberal family’s Christmas get-together, where he plans to ask for his grandmother’s wedding ring. The film mixes family drama and romantic comedy but commits to neither. The stellar cast’s innate charisma shines, but the film feels ashamed of its rom-com ambitions. It raises some interesting points around inclusion, tolerance, and dialogue, only to fall back on reductive tropes. It’s a rom-com dressed up in a family drama; as if it yearns to prove it’s about more than meet-cutes, but meet-cutes are all it offers.