Problem Child (1990)

Horrible sickening movie

This movie is just terrible and sickening. The poor little boy has clearly been abused and neglected for his whole life and passed along from foster family to foster family. No one seems to care about the boy or want to invest any interest in him. Eventually he is adopted by two people who really could care less about actually helping and raising a child. They adopt him for their own selfish purposes. "oh we'll finally be accepted by the neighbors and invited to parties." It's all about them and their own narcissism. It is beyond me why anyone would treat a child the way they do and expect him to be a perfect angel. I cannot understand how adopting a child for selfish reasons and then treating it badly is funny. And the icing on the cake... The boy and "mother" are kidnapped by some psycho..and the "father" could care less about the child until he realizes that the boy had grown to care about HIM. Yeah it's all about him. Ugh... neglected children and bad parenting are just not funny.. May 16, 2008

Decent, but not for the family. So who's it for?

There's quite a bit of funny stuff in this movie, especially with regards to the crooked Mayoral candidate Big Ben, and the weasley Orphanage manager Mr. Peabody. Everyone on this movie is a criminal except for John Ritter's friendly dad character.

This film has a lot of inappropriate stuff in it, so I don't think it's for kids. It's pretty childish though, so it doesn't seem to be for adults either. I don't know who it's for. I think it was a success in sales anyhow.

Seriously, Junior should have been slapped upside the head. The kid was bad. Nobody should have had to tolerate his crud, even though everyone else in that little town was a crook too.

Big Ben's the funniest character in the series. The man's a crook. Claiming to be All-American and selling out to the Japanese, and mooning everyone on TV. I guess he deserved to have his car window ruined by Junior. That was pretty funny actually.

This is a rude and crude movie, but fun to reference. July 10, 2005

Will this kid EVER shut-up!?!?!

Aaaaahhhhhhh!!! This not-so-cute little seven year-old will and annoying high-pitched voice is driving everyone at the adoption agency bonkers! The nuns pull their hair out and the kids are scared. Junior has this weird obsession with the Bow Tie Killer, a household name. But when a certain couple can't have a kid, they adopted the very sweet and nice junior (we all know the kids a devil, but they are stupid) but he turns mean REAL quick. May 31, 2005

Problem Child

The movie is basically about this young couple that decide to adopt a child, but they are duped into taking the adoption center's most troubled child, Junior, of them all. All hell breaks loose as Junior reaks havoc with insane practical jokes and low brow humor. This movie does fall into some typical cliches, stereotyped characters, and a lot of bad acting (with exception of John Ritter). Overall, this film is still pretty solid for a few laughs, but I wouldn't expect too much out of it. May 18, 2005

How could anybody enjoy this?

"Problem Child" has made my top ten worst movies list. How could anybody enjoy it?

"Problem Child" paved the way for Little Monster movies. In its footsteps would come "Clifford," "The Good Son" and more recently, "Are We There Yet?" In this genre, children are little sadistic monsters who stop just short of killing their adult supervisors and cackle maniacally. Usually, these movies are billed as "comedies." In this one, this kid could have a tea party with Damien from "The Omen" and Samarra from "The Ring." He's not funny, he's not charming or cute; he's a scary little creature.

Plus, are we supposed to think it's funny that his idol is a serial killer? That he writes letters to him? That the serial killer comes to visit and "takes him away," therefore putting him in danger? That the father proves himself at the end by battling the killer and rescuing the kid?

Horrible, cringe-inducing stuff. The filmmakers should have had a long discussion before making "Problem Child." March 14, 2005

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