KICKING AND SCREAMING (1995)

KICKING AND SCREAMING understands the terror of growing up. Its four college graduates face adulthood with anxiety and insecurity while their girlfriends seem more prepared for change. The humor is sharp, intelligent, and good natured, and the cast gives strong performances with good chemistry.

But the film’s entertainment comes at a serious cost. Promiscuity, fornication, voyeurism, sexual scenes with nudity, strong foul language, alcohol, smoking, and a father discussing adultery all shape the experience. The source review calls these inclusions irreparable flaws.

The film may speak honestly to adults who recognize fear of change and the need to mature. It is not appropriate for children or young teens. If you watch, make it an adults-only viewing.

Four young men are about to graduate from college, but none is eager to face life beyond campus. Grover struggles with his girlfriend’s plans to study in Prague. Max is cynical, Otis faces a geographic move for graduate school, and Skippy resists change altogether.

As they linger in college, drink, and talk through their anxieties, each must confront the realities of growing up.

Three stars means this is a genuinely entertaining film with significant flaws. Noah Baumbach’s directorial style is refreshing, using loose framing and wide shots against the characters’ intense internalizations. The humor is sharp and intelligent, giving added dimensions to the characters’ dilemma.

The cast blends well together and displays good chemistry. The film is funny, witty, and good natured, with Eric Stoltz giving a particularly strong performance. Still, the sexual material, nudity, and strong language irreparably mar the finished work.

The film presents college graduates searching for meaning through self-fulfillment. Its central characters are anxious about adulthood, insecure about the future, and resistant to change. Rather than receiving a clear moral or spiritual answer, they remain absorbed in their own angst, relationships, and personal choices.

The film recognizes that growing up requires facing reality, and it gives human dimensions to fear, uncertainty, and the pain of change. However, its treatment of sexuality includes promiscuity, fornication, voyeurism, adultery, and cheating. These choices distort biblical faithfulness and turn self-fulfillment into a guiding pursuit.

The characters’ refusal to mature also contrasts with Scripture’s call to leave childish ways behind: “When I became a man, I gave up childish ways” (1 Corinthians 13:11). The film identifies the fear of growing up, but does not provide a biblical answer for it.

KICKING AND SCREAMING is funny, intelligent, and well performed, with a refreshing directorial style. But its sexual material, nudity, strong language, and other content make it unsuitable for families and young teens. For discerning adults, the answer is WORTH THE TRIP — ADULTS ONLY. For a family movie night, choose something else.