I Don't Know How She Does It (2011)
Average Rating: 4/10
Reviews Counted: 109
Fresh: 18 | Rotten: 91
A limp comedy with a hopelessly outdated viewpoint on gender, featuring Sarah Jessica Parker in rote Carrie-mode.
Average Rating: 3.9/10
Critic Reviews: 34
Fresh: 5 | Rotten: 29
A limp comedy with a hopelessly outdated viewpoint on gender, featuring Sarah Jessica Parker in rote Carrie-mode.
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Average Rating: 2.8/5
User Ratings: 22,412
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Movie Info
Sarah Jessica Parker, Greg Kinnear, Pierce Brosnan, Olivia Munn and Christina Hendricks star in I Don't Know How She Does It, a comedy from director Douglas McGrath (Emma, Infamous) and producer Donna Gigliotti (The Reader, Let Me In). Based on the critically acclaimed bestseller by Allison Pearson, I Don't Know How She Does It follows a Boston-based working mother trying desperately to juggle marriage, children, and a high-stress job. -- (C) Weinstein
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Cast
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Sarah Jessica Parker
Kate Reddy -
Pierce Brosnan
Jack Abelhammer -
Kelsey Grammer
Clark Cooper -
Christina Hendricks
Allison, Allison Hender... -
Olivia Munn
Momo, Momo Hahn -
Greg Kinnear
Richard Reddy -
Seth Meyers
Chris Bunce -
Robbie Sublett
Dad -
Jane Curtin
Marla Reddy -
Mark Blum
Lew Reddy -
Busy Philipps
Wendy Best -
Sarah Shahi
Jeannie Lopietro -
Jessica Szohr
Paula -
Emma Rayne Lyle
Emily Reddy -
Julius Goldberg
Ben Reddy -
Theodore Goldberg
Ben Reddy -
James Murtaugh
Roger Harcourt -
Mika Brzezinski
Herself -
Eugenia Yuan
Jack's Receptionist -
Joseph Amato
I/T Guy -
Michelle Hurst
Nurse -
Beth Fowler
Clark's Secretary -
Michael Hogan
Bowling Alley Clerk -
Marceline Hugot
Beth -
Steve Routman
Marcus -
Raymond McNally
Roy -
Katie Hyde Lewars
Organic Mom -
Natalie Gold
Young Mother With Cell ... -
Lorna Pruce
Woman in Bowling Alley -
Jacob Alexander
Town Car Driver
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I Don't Know How She Does It Trailer & Photos
All Critics (110) | Top Critics (34) | Fresh (18) | Rotten (91) | DVD (3)
Oh, look, it's rich people in beautifully appointed houses and they're worried that the nanny might not arrive on time for them to make important morning meetings at work. Boo-hoo.
Top CriticIn the chick-flick world, hell is other women, and here specifically it's the stay-at-home wife and mother.
How nice it would have been had McKenna penned a couple of those audience-addressing interludes for Richard or Jack. What would these modern, succesful men tell us of themselves?
I Don't Know How She Does It purports to be about the difficult choices of modern motherhood, but it's too prim and cautious a movie to dip a pedicured toe into the murky waters of real choice.
The main problem is that this Boston-set flick quite unselfconsciously presents itself as if it were a pop-culture first to express ideas about the working-mom balancing act.
A lot more watchable than its awful trailer indicates.
This very typical romantic comedy flubs details repeatedly in order to reach the moments that it wants to reach.
About as funny as lice.
The title could easily apply to star Sarah Jessica Parker, for how such a charmless actor has maintained such career longevity and popularity is a marvel.
Tepid.
A serviceable comedy about women who want to 'have it all,' 'I Don't Know How She Does It' takes a look at a working mother who faces the challenge of balancing her career and her family.
If you enjoyed Sex and the City, you'll like this funny, sassy and fast-paced melting pot of domestic and business chaos, where the key to juggling is throwing, not catching
Too real to be escapist and too sitcom-ish to be realistic... not dramatic enough to be a drama, not comedic enough to be comedy....
There's nothing particular strong or telling about its comedy.
The film uses its breezy comic tone to makes some raw points about the fidelity, motherhood and compromise.
This sappy, crappy and condescending chick flick has been slapped together for those wishing to bask in the cinematic afterglow of the ever-radiant Sarah Jessica Parker.
A good helping of amusingly sharp lines cannot save this uncomfortably odd beast.
There is enough depth of drama to warrant a (short) TV series, but not a film.
What saves things from becoming entirely dreary is its cast ...
It ought to be easy to snark at this film, but the truth is it just left me feeling depressed. It's not how they do it that mystifies me, but why.
full review at Movies for the Masses
. . .the only possible way that it could have possibly had a happy resolution would have been if it had somehow turned into "Contagion" in the second half.
I Don't Know How She Does It is a lox -- and that may be an insult to smoked fish everywhere.
Audience Reviews for I Don't Know How She Does It
Super Reviewer
Super Reviewer
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- Kate Reddy: [from trailer] I love my work. Although sometimes I wish I didn't love it so much.
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- Kate Reddy: Instead of sleeping, I do the list.
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Foreign Titles
- Der ganz normale Wahnsinn - Working Mum (DE)
- Mais comment font les femmes? (FR)
Not bad yet not that great either. The movie really doesn't bore you it's just that the theme and plot of the story is not so great or intriguing. This is probably strictly for girls since the main idea of the story is to show that woman can do it all and they can.
Kate Reddy (Parker) devotes her days to her job with a Boston-based financial management firm. At night she goes home to her adoring, recently-downsized architect husband Richard (Kinnear) and their two young children. It's a non-stop balancing act, the same one that Kate's acerbic best friend and fellow working mother Allison (Christina Hendricks) performs on a daily basis, and that Kate's super-brainy, child-phobic young junior associate Momo (Olivia Munn) fully intends to avoid. When Kate gets handed a major new account that will require frequent trips to New York, Richard also wins the new job he's been hoping for--and both will be spreading themselves even thinner. Complicating matters is Kate's charming new business associate Jack Abelhammer (Brosnan), who begins to prove an unexpected source of temptation.