I look at it the same way I did when it came out; a pleasant, silly showcase for Robin Williams that has no connection to transsexualism whatsoever. I thought the part with the smoking cartoon character was kind of stupid. Of course at the time I was still a smoker and wasn’t amused by the self-righteousness tone. I’ll still stop and watch a bit of it if it’s on.
So it’s not really a matter of the movie holding up, as much it is that your tastes are becoming more fully formed.
If I saw it when I was twelve, I wouldn’t have been impressed. At that time, I thought Dr. Strangelove was the funniest movie I’d seen and Rocky and Bullwinkle was superior to anything Hanna-Barbera ever did.
(And there’s a reason you had to look up the Ritz Brothers – they were awful)
I read someplace that they were talking about doing a sequel to this movie, in which the older daughter would go off to college, “Mrs. Doubtfire” would follow to keep an eye on her and presumably zaniness ensues. Never happened obviously.
If the house was only wrecked when she came home early, then that implies that he was cleaning things up himself, and doing a good enough job of it that she couldn’t tell. Which further suggests that it was never all that wrecked.
Here’s the whole scene if you want to watch it. It’s clear by the end of Miranda pouring her heart out that Daniel/Mrs. D had no idea how hard the marriage had been on Miranda.
I think a lot of people have lost sight in the whole rush to find problematic entertainment about what it is we’re trying to get beyond. Blackface is horrible because it makes a marginalized group the butt of a joke - it’s a tool of oppression. The whole point of it is to hate and to belittle and demean and disempower.
There are a lot of people who seem to have superficially understood what it is that we’re trying to move past as a society and think “someone dressed up to be something they’re not! I spotted one, guys! cancel it!” without understanding the reasoning behind it.
A great example of this overreaching hysteria is the removal from the streaming services of the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons episode of Community where with certainty no humor was derived from belittling any group. There are similar examples, but that one seems particularly ridiculously to me and such a shame since it’s such a great episode that people won’t see when they watch on Netflix.
I haven’t seen Mrs. Doubtfire for probably 25+ years, so I can’t remember for sure if there are any jokes at the expense of cross-dressers, transexuals, or any other marginalized group, but my memory is that there is not. The humor does not derive from mocking them at all, rather, the humor derives from the absurdity of the actions of Robin Williams’ character and the inherent humor that can come from someone pretending to be something they’re not.
So, as such, I don’t think there’s any good reason that Mrs. Doubtfire should not be made today. However, the fact that a lot of people don’t actually understand what’s problematic and just want to get on the next bandwagon to find and be outraged at something they’ve identified as being superficially similar to problematic things, you’d probably see a misguided effort to paint it as offensive and anti-trans.
Plus, Shirley called it a hate crime. So, even if it is considered black face, which could probably be argued either way, he was immediately called out for doing it. And with Shirley being Black and not a social justice warrior, it carries some weight. Unlike, for example, if Britta had been the one to say something about it.
I always say, “men in drag is always funny”.
I also never mean it, but Hollywood sure seems to think that is true.
It was a comedy…they weren’t going for Kramer vs. Kramer, here.
I was going to craft a pro-Tootsie post, but now I don’t have to.
Tootsie is twice as funny and 10 times smarter.
IMHO, of course.
mmm
Not a huge Mrs. Doubtfire fan, but Tootsie is a major “pass” for me. In his long career I’ve liked Dustin Hoffman in exactly one role–in All the President’s Men. Probably my least favorite actor of his level of celebrity, never really understood what he brought to the table or why anyone liked his acting.
What about Hook?
Regarding Tootsie, I saw it when it was in the theaters, and it was great. It was released in the same year as E.T. and Gandhi and all three were up for the big Oscars (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, etc.), with Gandhi winning most of them. But honestly, that’s an epic biopic that I’ve no interest in rewatching but have seen E.T. and Tootsie several times since.
Midnight Cowboy? Straight Time? The Graduate? Marathon Man?
Nah. His magnum opus is Master Shifu in the Kung Fu Panda movies.
Shifu or Xifu means master in the chinese dialects. 
I know. If the stories were set in Japan, the character would be called Master Sensei. It’s a frigging cartoon.
And chai means tea. We Americans and our doubling Asians!
More like Kramer vs Newman?
Not just Asians.
In Arizona we have the Department of Redundancy Department names of Table Mesa and Picacho Peak. (which of course mean Table Table and Peak Peak.)