So, then that happened

‘Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day’ movie review

By Jerrison Oracion, Senior Columnist

5/5

In the bestselling book Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, Alexander Cooper goes through a bad day and thinks that the rest of his family doesn’t have bad days. But in the film version, when he celebrates his 12th birthday by himself, he wishes that the rest of his family would go through a bad day like him.

Things go wrong right from the start of the day when Alexander’s parents sleep in. His father, Ben (Steve Carell), goes to a job interview and has to take the baby with him, who is a distraction. His mother, Kelly (Jennifer Garner), publishes a children’s book that includes a typo, which is read out by Dick Van Dyke, who makes a brief appearance in the film. Alexander’s older brother, Anthony (Dylan Minnette), tries to get his driver’s license, but fails the test when he answers a phone call from his girlfriend while driving. His sister, Emily (Kerris Dorsey), also has a bad day and does a school play.

“I think that you just gotta have the bad days, so you can love the good days even more,” Alexander tells his family in the movie trailer.

The film is more exciting than the book because, instead of only showing Alexander’s bad day, the movie shows all of the obstacles that the Cooper family goes through on their bad day.