User Reviews

John Monroe (William Windom) is at work inside the Manhattanite office when a rumbling freight elevator causes him to wreck his sketch. He tells his editor Hamilton Greeley (Harold J. Stone) that he cannot work under those conditions and will work from home until he is given better arrangements. John comes home to his wife Ellen (Joan Hotchkis) in the middle of the day and is soon followed by his daughter Lydia (Lisa Gerritsen). Lydia says she sits in front of a distracting boy at school and is not going back until they change her seat. Similarly, she wants to work from home as well, under tutelage. John forces her to go back to school without discussion, and Lydia threatens to run away to nearby New York. John tells Ellen that he thinks if she did, she would learn the valuable lesson she is needing. In telling her they will let her do so, they are surprised to find that she has a very practical approach of how she'll start a new life, complete with money she has saved. John then decides to run away with her (to keep an eye on her). (This is a plot we've seen before, namely "The Brady Bunch".) They begin their journey on train and enter New York City to dine with separate checks at a restaurant. She decides to live with her aunt Kate (Carole Cook) who welcomes her with open arms. John returns home concerned, but is determined she learns a lesson. At the sketch table he begins imagining a poor fate for Lydia. He returns to his sister's house to find she has gone, and sees his intended lesson has gone awry.

This is an engaging entry, but the solution is one that could have been clearly remedied at the start. There is little animation in this feature, limited to walking to the house and a purely drawn short sketch of Lydia's imagined fate.

An aside, I find the closing credits sound much like those on 90s Nickelodeon shows.