'The Wonder Weeks' (2023). Movie on Netflix: Only for Cool yet Responsible Moms and Dads

The Wonder Weeksis a film directed by Appie Boudellah and Aram van de Rest. It stars Sallie Harmsen, Soy Kroon and Yolanthe Cabau. It is based on a novel written by Frank Plooij and Hetty van de Rijt.

But if, on the other hand, you are family people who believe in a better world and that your children could live peacefully with AI and sustainability… The Wonder Weeks offers you a gentle proposal and a chance to encounter the challenges of raising a baby.

Movie review

On a technical level, a correct film, with good performances of rather light comedy, the kind that won’t win you a Cesar (I mean the cinematographic award, not the kitten food, don’t be mean) or an Oscar.

It has a simple, natural script and is treated as a light comedy (also) at script and direction level, with a slow pace that marks well the times of the sequences and these, in the general tone, manage to interconnect these stories of “raising babies”.

As for the dialogues, it’s ok, it knows how to keep the family tone for new parents, with jokes just spicy enough to be “hip” yet “familiar”, traditional yet cool, and cool at the same time as naive.

It’s almost a TV movie, a light comedy, a product intended for family consumption that, without going too far into drama, prefers a friendly realistic touch to a journey to the most… terrifying neorealism.

It has the virtue (or the defect, depending on how you look at it) of not falling into bitterness and, without being shallow, knowing how to maintain the tone very well, “its” tone, and it pleases without leaving any significant trace.

Our opinion

It works well in its extremely kind and comforting tone, familiar and almost tender. It knows how to aim at drama without falling into it, it knows how to lean out to comedy without being so.