Shelley Long had Florence Henderson right there on the set to guide her and Gary Cole certainly had the spirit of Robert Reed channeled to play Mike Brady. The two headed up a cast that really satirized the famous sugary sitcom that Paramount television brought us from 1969 to 1974, The Brady Bunch.

Time has stood still for the family in The Brady Bunch Movie. Gary Cole and Shelley Long have raised their blended family right from the Seventies. The parents and kids listen to the music, dress in the fashion and behave otherwise as if the Eighties and Nineties just never took place. The kids stand out quite a bit from their peers in their suburban school.

The main plot such as it is has the Bradys being under siege by their neighbors, the Dittmyers, Michael McKean and Jean Smart who need the Brady home in order to complete a big real estate deal. They'll get it by fair means or foul. The Dittmyers are best described as poor relations of that other TV family, the Bundys.

A big part of the problem with this film is that you would have to have been a fan of the show and presumably have seen it in reruns a gazillion times on the TVLand channel in order to appreciate it. About 15 of the various episodes are used in creating the plot. That's a component that someone who never saw the show couldn't possibly get.

Still some of the sly innuendo also comes from the Nineties culture with RuPaul as the school guidance counselor eying Christopher Daniel Barnes as Greg and a young lesbian girl carrying a big old torch for Marcia played by Christine Taylor. Jennifer Elise Cox has taken over nicely the role of the ever dissatisfied middle sister Jan who the real and original Carol Brady as the grandmother finally deals with in the appropriate manner.

As in any of the television Brady episodes goodness and vacuity ultimately triumph and to find out how and which episode plot lines are used to bring that about, you'll have to sit back and enjoy the big screen version of America's most famous blended family.

Shelley Long, Gary Cole, and Christine Taylor lead the cast to recreate the iconic 70s TV family. It's a stroke of genius to bring the gang into the 90s. They are a school of fish out of water. The storyline to raise $20,000 for back property taxes sounds so familiar.

Jennifer Elise Cox is especially funny as the head bopping insecure Jan suffering Middle Child Syndrome. "But Jan, you don't have any friends." Everybody in the family is funny. Some of the modern people overplay their characters. It's not really necessary. Most of them are better off playing the straight character to the family's wackiness. Although Alanna Ubach turns in one of the funnier characters as Marcia's pining best friend.

When I first heard about this film being in production, I was about as happy as you'd be if you heard about a giant meteorite heading to destroy the Earth! After all, despite the original show having a bit of a following, the show was completely saccharine and impossible for anyone other than kids to like. So why, oh why, would I want to see this?! Well, it turns out I was wrong--wrong because the film WAS good to watch and wrong because this was NOT the same Brady Bunch I remember from my youth.

So what was so right about this film? Well, first it was not a remake of the show, but a parody of it--the only way this could have worked. In this case, it's the same sort of Brady family BUT they are living exactly as they did in 1970--despite it being 1995. In other words, the clothes, the language, the actors and their spot-on impersonations of the originals (I particularly loved Gary Cole and the way he talked just like Mike Brady) and the music are all circa 1970--and everyone around the Brady family just stares at them in total disbelief. TO make things even better, there is a wonderful visit from Davy Jones as well as a wonderful plot involving Jan and hear jealousy of Marsha, Marsha, Marsha! As for the plot, this might be the biggest weakness. While it isn't bad, the film's theme of the evil neighbors and the Brady family losing their home never is as fun or interesting as the sequel--A VERY BRADY SEQUEL--and you MUST see this sequel. It is a hoot!