MY FATHER THE HERO

year: 1994 cast: Gérard Depardieu, Katherine Heigl rating: **1/2

Having a fourteen-year-old girl dressed in a thong is pure exploitation cinema – or maybe not so pure. Then again this was a mainstream comedy starring fresh outta GREEN CARD crossover-fame Gérard Depardieu reprising his role from the French film 'Mon père, ce héros' as put-upon father Andre, who takes his daughter to the Bahamas for some quality bonding.

But the pouting Nicole, played by a willowy Katherine Heigl, wants nothing of it.

Within one afternoon in the balmy paradise she has her eyes set on at least three guys – one in particular is Ben (Dalton James), whom she tells ninety minutes worth of lies to. First being that her father is really her pimp that, having rescued her from the streets where she lived as a junky, now takes her on lush vacations. Second that she really needs to escape his manipulative tyranny. Thus the locals and tourists all think the kindhearted Andre is a rich seedy millionaire robbing the cradle, providing Depardieu a filler role outshined by Nicole’s convoluted tricks and deceptions making little sense to begin with.

Director Steve Minor began his career with low budget exploitation films, and perhaps showing half naked jailbait can be justified as such. It does attempt setting up Andre’s frustration that his daughter, who he hadn’t seen in five years, has become such a shockingly beautiful girl he must protect from ogling males: if only he can connect on her level. And yet there's little reason for daughter to be so bitter... and father's struggle to make up for his absence is peripheral. He's more stressed about being forgiven by his girlfriend back home than anything else. While she, like any teenager, desperately wants to be noticed.   

The title describes little about the film as a whole. One scene where Andre water-skis beyond his capacity is reminiscent of another unintentionally creepy picture titled SUPERDAD starring Bob Crane as a parent who tries anything to be, you got it, his daughter's hero.

And yet there’s hardly any time centered on father and daughter here. Nicole's ruse to keep thwarting Andre works all too well: He's hardly in the picture at all.

Katherine Heigl and Gérard Depardieu

Exploitative or otherwise?

Katherine Heigl's morning mope

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