Retro Review: The Addams Family (1991)

Welcome back to what has become my yearly series of Halloween reviews! Typically on this blog I've stuck to reviewing new theatrical releases, but I've also had fun diving back into the past on occasion. I've thought about doing this more often, getting a good mix of older movies and newer movies, but I've had a hard time finding specific excuses to do so. However, when the holidays roll around, that's the perfect excuse. This will be my third Halloween doing these older Halloween reviews. My first year I went extremely gung-ho and exhausted myself by getting 7 or 8 reviews in during the month. Last year I slowed down a bit to about once per week, which is what my current plan is for this year. Maybe some weeks I'll get two reviews in, but I have a goal of at least one per week. When I polled Facebook this year for suggestions, I got mostly crickets from friends, which surprised me a bit, but is OK since I have plenty of ideas of my own. My first idea was to explore "The Addams Family" in preparation for the new animated that comes out next weekend. Said animated movie has not yet excited me as it doesn't look that good, but at the same time I'm not as up to speed on the franchise as a whole, so I thought I'd take my time to educate myself. So here we are.

In exploring the history of this franchise, I learned a few things that perhaps many of you had already known for a long time. "The Addams Family" is an old property that dates all the way back to the 1930s when creator Charles Addams did single-panel cartoons for "The New Yorker." He continued those for several decades until his death in 1988. In the meantime, TV show creators and filmmakers have been obsessed with this family and have made many attempts in bringing these characters to life. The first said attempt, and perhaps the most iconic, is the live action TV show that ran for 64 episodes from 1964 to 1966. About a decade later, the first animated series by Hanna-Barbera ran for 16 episodes in 1973 after first showing up in an episode of "Scooby-Doo" in 1972. Then in 1977 we had the first TV movie titled "Halloween with the New Addams Family" that reunited most of the original cast from the 60's TV show. In 1991, the franchise was revived with this movie that we're about to review, which spawned a sequel in 1993 titled "Addams Family Values." There was a direct-to-video film in 1998 titled "Addams Family Reunion" as well as a 21 episode animated series from 1992-1993 and a 65 episode live-action series from 1998-1999.

How much of this have I watched? Not much. I'm very familiar with the idea behind it all and I've always liked the original theme song that dates back to the 1960s show, because, you know, my first name is Adam. So my family is the "Adam's Family" (OK, not the Addams Family, but close enough). Yet with all this Addams Family saturation, do we really need a new animated Addams Family movie? That will be the question going into the new movie, whenever I get around to seeing it. But I can't go into that movie without having any sort of knowledge of the franchise as a whole, which is why I'm now reviewing this 1991 movie. No, it's not the quintessential Addams Family property. The 1993 sequel "Addams Family Values" even has better reviews. But I think this is a good place to start. It also did quite well for itself at the box office, earning $113.5 million domestically off a reported $30 million budget. When adjusting for ticket price inflation, that $113.5 million is equivalent of about $240 million with 2019 ticket prices. Compared to the movies around it, it was the seventh highest grossing film of 1991. Has it developed into a Halloween classic? That's a great question. I'm not sure.

Without question, the thing that this movie gets right is the setting, the tone and the characters. The Addams family has always been a family that is a bit odd and cooky when compared to the outside world. They're a bit of a Goth-inspired group, or perhaps it's the other way around. Goth people are inspired by them? I'm not expert in that area, but either way, the purpose of them is to be different, which is why I think the opening to this is great. They have Christmas carolers on their doorstep trying to get their attention, yet they're all hiding on the roof, ready to pull some sort of prank on the carolers. The movie cuts away to the opening credits before showing the results of that, but that was a fun introduction. Then we dive into their world, which I rather enjoy. There's a certain humor here that is difficult to get right that I think the movie nails. It's a bit of a dry comedy mixed with a dark comedy as they're all doing things that are weird and creepy, but are perfectly normal to them. All of the actors do a great job of selling everything without even cracking a smile or making things look cheesy and dumb. Thus they do a great job of capturing the spirit of what this family is all about. Yet even though this is dry and dark, it never becomes inappropriate.

That's why I think this is the type of movie where you can kick back and enjoy while inviting the whole family. Maybe perhaps not young kids as this is PG-13, but I personally think this is a very light PG-13. I was even assuming it was PG while I was watching and got a bit surprised when I looked it up to see a PG-13 rating. Perhaps in retrospect, there's a couple of scenes here and there that warrant the PG-13, but for the most part this is pretty time. I think the most enjoyable part is seeing the characters' interactions with each other. Leading the way we have excellent performances from Angelica Huston and Raul Julia as Morticia and Gomez Addams, the parents of the family. They are a bizarrely wonderful couple to watch and do a great job of guiding the story, making things fun and amusing along the way. Then of course we have a whole host of side characters. I don't remember all of their times, but it was rather amusing watching the hand walk around as well as the Frankenstein's monster looking tall guy hanging around. I believed they call him lurch. But of course stealing the show is young Christina Ricci as Wednesday Addams. Some of the funniest moments is when she's trying to nonchalantly murder her little brother Pugsley, with him being perfectly fine with it.

Of course a lot of credit has to be given to the people in charge of the set design, as well as the costume and makeup people. Recreating the mansion they live in was beautifully done. It was fun being in the mansion, paying attention to all the detail put into it. There were a lot of great shots that led to an overall solid visual aesthetic. If creepy and Goth is what they were going for, that's exactly what they pulled off. If you want to sit down and get yourself into the Halloween spirit with a bunch of friends, this movie provides a great opportunity, especially for those who may not be fans of intense horror films. This will put you into the Halloween spirit without giving you nightmares since the setting of it all is perfectly Halloween. And yes, along with that, all of the characters fit perfectly into this atmosphere, which is why I praise the makeup and hairstyling crew. I imagine that's a lot of work that often goes unnoticed, but is a critical part of the film, especially with something like this. And even though I'm not super familiar with the original 60's show, it doesn't take much research to learn that they did their best job to pay homage to all of the original characters by getting their looks right. There's also plenty of visuals that for the 90's holds up rather well, which is nice because not all 90's movies do.

You may have noticed that I have been dancing around the elephant in the room, though. That's because I didn't want to come off as super negative towards this movie because there's a lot that I really enjoyed. It's a great atmosphere and a lot of great characters. But there's a plot in this movie that is just not good. It involves Gomez's brother Fester Addams, who's played wonderfully by Christopher Lloyd, but has been missing for 25 years. The Addams' lawyer Tully Alford owes money to a woman named Abigail Craven. When in her office, he notices that her adopted son Gordon looks a lot like Fester Adams, so Gordon decides to pose as Fester to try to find the Addams' secret vault where they have their money. So that's it. Abigail and Gordon are trying to steal from Addams because they think they're dumb enough to fall for it. There's not a whole lot of drama or suspense. The resolution of the whole thing can be seen from a mile away and there's not much character development along the way. It felt like they had a hard time coming up with a good enough plot for this first feature-length adaptation and never quite had the right idea. So without much of a plot, it's hard for the movie to be too terribly interesting, but there's still plenty to enjoy along the way.

My conclusions here are that perhaps "The Addams Family" is a property that's best fit for what it was originally created as. A TV series or a cartoon. With simple, 20-30 minute episodes, you don't have to be too creative when it comes to plot. You can just enjoy short, episodic adventures with your delightful cast of characters and your wonderful scenery. Perhaps I should test this theory by diving into the original TV show for comparison. Or at least test the waters with the show by watching an episode or two to see how it is. And if they did find a way to be more entertaining and creative with the sequel "Addams Family Values," maybe that's worth checking out. And if you are one who is more well-versed into the whole "Addams Family" world, feel free to give your personal commentary on all of that. Because I can understand if this has become a Halloween favorite for you. There's a lot to like here. But I can also see why this only has a 65 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes. It's something that, when you look at with a critical eye, doesn't quite accomplish everything that it could've despite immense potential. And maybe that's the reason why this one doesn't get brought up too often when people list off their favorite Halloween movies. My grade for it is a 7/10.