Look Who’s Talking

Forgettable and innocuous, Look Who’s Talking follows Kirstie Alley’s Mollie as she becomes pregnant with the child of her married lover (George Segal’s Albert) and, after delivering a boy named Mikey, attempts to raise the kid by herself – although she eventually does receive help from a friendly (and persistent) New York City taxi driver (John Travolta’s James). It’s a fairly standard premise that’s employed to consistently middling effect by writer/director Amy Heckerling, as the filmmaker infuses the proceedings with virtually every single convention and touchstone one might’ve anticipated – including, regrettably, a montage of Mollie embarking on a series of dates with unreasonably oddball individuals. The film’s big gimmick, in which we hear the baby’s thoughts via Bruce Willis’ voiceover work, ultimately adds little to the narrative and seems to have been added purely to juice the otherwise stale proceedings, and yet Heckerling’s briskly-paced and easygoing approach to her own screenplay ensures that Look Who’s Talking remains, at the very least, relatively watchable throughout. It’s clear that the movie’s extremely mild success is due mostly to the charismatic work of its two stars, with the palpable chemistry between Alley and Travolta elevating the majority of their scenes together (although it does become increasingly difficult to swallow their predominantly platonic relationship) – which does, in the end, cement Look Who’s Talking‘s place as a passable yet entirely unmemorable romantic comedy.

**1/2 out of ****