Wake up, it's just a bad movie

This is Kafka's nightmare scenario: One morning, a man wakes up and finds he's turned into a giant bug. He must deal with the inner turmoil that follows. This is writer/director Brett Ratner's scenario: One morning, a man wakes up to find himself in a four-bedroom, two-bathroom house in New Jersey with two kids and a wife. He must deal with the inner turmoil that follows.

What's happened to our nightmares? If Ratner took his story to Kafka, what would have been the response? Hopefully, a thwack over the nose with a rolled-up Eastern European newspaper.

"The Family Man" is one of those movies you can call a "Hollywood movie" without compunction, since every second thought during its two-hour duration is: "Oh geez, what a Hollywood movie." The main characters are played with studied finesse by Nicolas Cage and Tea Leoni, the set just drips with big budget, and the cinematography makes everyone look extra beautiful and prosperous. Not to mention the really nice story, which somehow recalls being in a theater with friends at age 13 pretending to barf every time someone on screen said or did something sincere and loving. During "Family Man," I counted eight incidents where I had to refrain from pushing a forefinger into the mouth and rolling my eyes in mock agony.