The Stepford Children (1987 TV Movie) User Reviews

Insipid TV movie sequel with a strong climax

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 7 May 2015]

The second sequel to the 1975 sci-fi classic THE STEPFORD WIVES, following on from REVENGE OF THE STEPFORD WIVES; THE STEPFORD HUSBANDS would follow in the 1990s. These three sequels are all television movies of varying quality, but at least they're more interesting than the bland Hollywood remake with Nicole Kidman.

Sadly, THE STEPFORD CHILDREN is a largely uninteresting retread of the first film's plot, except that now the children have been transformed into perfect specimens rather than the wives. It's a bit of an odd choice, making the first hour of this film very slow and laboured, because we already know the story and events from the first film so why drag it out again?

It doesn't help that the characters range from the uninteresting to the downright unlikeable, although some interest builds with the younger cast members as the story progresses. The only part I really liked was the climax, which is actually decent and pretty frightening; we get to see what THE STEPFORD CHILDREN look like underneath and it's a good effect. A shame we had to sit through the rest of the production to get to this bit, though.

Too slow

[BakuryuuTyranno · 4/10 · 14 January 2011]

In a sequel we already know what's supposed to be happening so any sense of mystery is redundant. And so watching creepy children and women act "strangely" isn't exactly exciting.

I also must question the intelligence of turning their children into machines since eventually, the population of the Gentlemen's Club would die, at least some would, there would be no one to continue their bloodline and a suspicious number of purposeless citizens roaming around.

So the plot doesn't make sense really and because of the slow pace, it's difficult to watch without noticing the idiot plot. Technically not a bad movie, just a very flawed one.

This isn't great but it is entertaining and worth a viewing

[kevin_robbins · 5/10 · 15 March 2022]

Stepford Children (1987) is a movie I recently found on a random streaming service. The storyline follows a family with two high school aged children that moves out of New York to Stepford, Connecticut. Shortly after arriving the dad joins the local mens club, the wife tries to fit in and the kids attend the most prestigious high school in the country. The kids quickly realize they don't fit in and the mother doesn't realize things are strange around here as she tries to address the trouble her kids keep getting in...will the family adjust to Stepford or will Stepford have to adjust to them?

This movie is directed by Alan J. Levi (Robocop) and stars Barbara Eden (I Dream of Jeannie), Don Murray (Conquest of the Planet of the Apes), Tammy Lauren (Wishmaster), Pat Corley (Murphy Brown) and Dick Butkus (Gremlins 2).

The concept for this storyline was interesting and while a bit far fetched still fun to watch unfold. They went a little over the top making the kids look ultra 80s so any transformations would be gigantic. The father/children trips were entertaining and well done as were the transformations. The acting is actually pretty good and I loved the ending. These movies always pickup once everyone is aligned with what's going on. The mother in this was a really great character.

Overall this was a nice spin on the Stepford storyline for fans of the series. This isn't great but it is entertaining and worth a viewing. I would score this a 5-5.5/10 and recommend seeing it once.

What Ever Happened to Stepford's Children?

[smitgin · 3 August 2002]

It has been 15 years since I first saw "The Stepford Children" on TV, so I'm a little fuzzy on the details. But from what I recall, this chapter in the saga was much better than the uninspired "Revenge of the Stepford Wives." The "Children" TV movie tried to combine the best of both previous ventures with an enjoyable result (for TV-fare). Barbara Eden did a fine job as the new wife in peril. Keeping kids in line has never been so fun! Unfortunately, as this movie had no big stars other than Ms. Eden, it has never seen the light of day on VHS or DVD. That is too bad. "Revenge" at least got a VHS release due to Don Johnson being in the credits. Maybe we will be lucky enough to get a better quality transfer to DVD for the 30th Anniversary edition of the original with the two TV movies added in a box set... Now that would bring a smile to Dis' face up there in the Men's Association.

As dull as dishwater.

[poolandrews · 2/10 · 25 January 2011]

The Stepford Children starts as the Harding family leave the big city for the final time & head for the small peaceful town of Stepford where they plan to settle down, Steven Harding (Don Murray) used to live in Stepford some seventeen years ago & is familiar with the town although his wife Laura (Barbara Eden) & their two teenage children Mary (Tammy Lauren) & David (Randall Batinkoff) have no experience of Stepford themselves. At first Stepford seems perfect, the ideal place to raise a family & live but it becomes clear that Stepford is too perfect & hides a sinister secret. David meets Lois (Debbie Barker) at school & the two quickly become an item but Lois remarks at how her mother has suddenly changed, then Lois undergoes the sudden change to an emotionless shell & David becomes suspicious. It seems that the men of Stepford are replacing their wives & children with perfect robot replicas & David is next on the list...

Directed by Alan J. Levi this second made for television sequel to The Stepford Wives (1975) came seven years after our last visit in Revenge of the Stepford Wives (1980) & adds nothing to the formula firmly established by the original two films & is one of the dullest films I have sat through in quite some time & to describe The Stepford Children as a slow burner would be an understatement. Sure, the wives of Stepford are given a break this time around & the Stepford children are the ones killed & replaced by so-called perfect robots to fulfill their father's idealogical desires & aspirations but it makes little difference in the end, the same sort of themes & ideas are brought up yet again with the basic notion of a necessity for human emotion & feeling. Boring. Unoriginal. Dull. Take your pick. At over an hour & a half The Stepford Children takes ages to go anywhere, one big problem is that if you are anyway familiar with original The Stepford Wives novel or film then surely you will know what's going on straight away & the attempt by the script to turn the story into a mystery thriller falls down flat on it's face. I just sat there waiting for The Stepford Children to get going but it never did, I sat there waiting to get the robot reveal out of the way early on as surely not many audiences would be totally unaware with the concept behind The Stepford Wives but it plays it incredibly seriously until the very end & tries to maintain an air of mystery, suspense & surprise which it never can hope to as it's not original or well written enough. A real bore of a film that feels like a family drama for an hour as kids rebel against their parents & the system of conformity with less than satisfying results, the character's are poor, the dialogue is forgettable & nowhere near enough happens. One to avoid unless you have insomnia.

While the first hour & a bit are dull drama the last ten or fifteen minutes veers into sci-fi horror territory with a laboratory of half human half robots that look quite bad, the special effects budget was obviously minimal & at the very end all they seem to do is just tap the Harding's car window & nothing else despite everything being set-up for a big final showdown. There's no real excitement, action, tension, suspense or gore to speak of & even the story is illogical. If Steven replaced David wouldn't his wife Laura have noticed? If all the Stepford child are to be replaced who would carry on the Men's Association? Do robot's grow old? How would Stepford explain an eternally young population that never aged? What do these Stepford men do with the dead bodies of the people they replace with robot's? The Speford Children as a film is frankly as dull, emotionless & bland as it's title character's. Not good.

Made for the NBC television network the entire thing has a very forgettable look, there's no style here & nothing of any great interest happens. The acting is bland, no-one stands out & the cast look bored.

The Stepford Children is a really, really boring film that takes ages to repeat the theme's & ideas of the original & goes nowhere with them itself. It doesn't even try to add anything to the mix other than the robotic children angle which plays out exactly the same as the robotic wives angle anyway. Followed by yet another made for television sequel The Stepford Husbands (1996).

A hollow film

[parausted · 1/10 · 27 December 2015]

Predictable, mediocre, deliberately confusing. What in "The Stepford Wives" was abnormal (the hollow robot housewives) in the conservative society it is normal. In "The Stepford Children" what is normal in a civilized society (good manners, respect, balance aesthetic conception of all that is human: music, language, etc.), is presented as abnormal, and abnormal (bad manners, bad music, lack of culture, ideas, reflection) is presented as desirable. The intention of the film is to flatter the younger audience (already around 1990 were the ones who paid to see this kind of fake art.. and probably in those years began the disastrous film industry that exists today).

Dull and Uninspired

[Uriah43 · 4/10 · 20 November 2022]

This film begins with a man named "Steven Harding" (Don Murray) purchasing a home in the small town of Stepford, Connecticut where he used to live about 18 years earlier. He then returns to New York City and together both he and his wife "Laura Harding" (Barbara Eden) pack up the car and head on out. Also with them are their two teenage children "David Harding" (Randall Batinkoff) and "Mary Harding" (Tammy Lauren) who are both a little rebellious at times--especially with their father. Be that as it may, once they arrive both David and Mary are shocked to see just how dull and boring all the other kids in school are. There is, however, one particular teenage girl named "Lois Gregson" (Debbie Barker) who also recently arrived in Stepford and isn't like the others and because of that both her and David hit it off right away. For that matter, both Laura and Lois' mother "Sandy Gregson" (Sharon Spelman) also become good friends due in large part because everyone else in Stepford seems so strange. And then one day Sandy also begins acting different--and this has a direct effect on everyone involved. Now, rather than reveal any more, I will just say that I honestly didn't expect too much from this film until I noticed that Barbara Eden was starring in it. I mention this because she is one of those actresses who can typically take a film with an uninspired plot and bring it up to a reasonable level. Unfortunately, this wasn't one of those times because the plot in this film was basically the same as the original movie, "The Stepford Wives" and its sequel, "Revenge of the Stepford Wives" with the only difference being the age of some of the victims. That being said, there really weren't too many surprises here. Throw in a rather botched ending and I honestly have no choice but to rate it as slightly below average.

Spice Up Your Life, Stepfordize Your Wife!

[Coventry · 7/10 · 28 February 2009]

The third entry in the "Stepford" franchise, but apparently the three made-for-TV obscure sequels are incredibly obscure and hard to trace down, whereas the 70's original as well as the blockbuster remake with Nicole Kidman are commonly known and very popular. I haven't seen either the early 80's "Revenge of the Stepford Wives" or the mid 90's "The Stepford Husbands", but this "The Stepford Children" is a quite charming and highly entertaining little film. It's basically the exact same film as the original; obviously less mysterious yet much cheesier and incredibly 80's to the nth degree. The main difference here, like the title implies, is that not just the liberated wives but also the rebellious and punk teenage offspring in town undergoes the typical and highly effective "Stepford treatment", licensed by the local Men's Association. For some reason the scenario attempts to uphold the Stepford mystery until late in the film, even though nobody is likely to watch this sequel before having checked out the original and presumably everybody also knows about the denouement. The Harding family is all packed and ready to move from the grisly city of New York to the small and peaceful community of Stepford. Particularly father Steven is excited about their new life because he already lived in Stepford and always wanted to go back ever since his first wife, whom his new wife Laura and adolescent children Mary and David know very little about, died under mysterious circumstances. The town is almost too perfect, with picturesque neighbors and model students, and especially the modern teenagers face huge difficulties to adjust. Their efforts to modernize the place and take the local youth of Stanford in tow cause confrontations with the eminent townsfolk, particularly the members of the Men's Association, and put the familial relationships under a lot of stress. David meets and falls in love with the last "normal" girl in school Lois, but when even she transforms into a domestic dummy overnight, David can convince his skeptical mother to investigate the sinister Stanford secret. The first hour of "The Stanford Children" is slow-paced and rather tame, but the finale is trashy and cheesy like the VHS cover promises and like a late 80's thriller ought to be, in fact. The modus operandi behind the Stanford secrets is illustrated in greater detail, and I think horror fans and lovers of the original film will appreciate that. At least, I did. The overall plot still doesn't make a lot of sense and the script is chock-full of irrational aspects, but it's nonetheless an engaging formula and undoubtedly one that evokes an atmosphere of suspense and fear. The acting performances are far above average. Especially the arrogant and obnoxious members of the Men's Association depict plausible characters and even teenage players Tammy Lauren and Randall Batinkoff give away impressive performances. Recommended without hesitation!

Poor relative of The Stepford Wives. Not recommended.

[irivlin · 3/10 · 29 October 2023]

Considering the excellence of the original Stepford Wives, I find it very hard to believe that Ira Levin had a hand in this very poor "clone" (no pun intended).

It's a formulaic as I've ever seen coming out of Hollywood. We all know the ending from the first five minutes of the the start.

Barbara Eden just does not suit this role. For starters, she's too old, secondly, she's typecast and we can't get Jeanie out of our heads.

It's poorly directed and all the acting is hammed up to the limit, with each character trying his or her self to be a silly stereotype.

Richard Anderson, who played Oscar Goldman in The 6 million Dollar Man is no match for Patrick O'Neal in The Stepford Wives. Everything about this movie shouts "Low budget" and "Hurried".

I watched this movie, so you don't have to. Please don't make the same mistake.

BTW, the remake of The Stepford Wives (with Christopher Walken and Glen Close is even worse.

A fairly decent Stepford sequel

[Red-Barracuda · 6/10 · 4 February 2014]

The Stepford Children is the second sequel to the cult 70's movie The Stepford Wives. This is the only sequel I have seen but I am aware they are all made for TV movies. The angle that this instalment takes is that now it is the children of Stepford who are being re-made to fit the ultra-conservative model favoured by the men of the community. I guess its underlying message is a warning against regimented conformity and the pursuit of an idealised 'perfection'. In this sense it's no different really to the first film but because the focus is now on teenagers as opposed to women, it takes the message away from the misogyny of a male dominated society to the angst of teenagers growing up and trying to remain individuals in a society that tries to mould them. It's the kind of themes that remain very relevant.

The story focuses on a family who move to the town of Stepford from the big city. The two kids do not fit into the community at all well, seeing as all the other teenagers from the town seem to be lifeless automatons. Although, it does have to be said that these two are the most 80's looking teenagers imaginable – it's hairspray, indoor-shades-wearing and headbands all the way! Anyway, before long their father becomes a member of the ominous Men's Association and he is soon convinced to have his wayward children 'corrected'.

This is overall a fairly decent film. The Stepford set-up is an interesting one and more leverage is engineered from the basic premise. But obviously the sense of mystery from the original movie is long gone and this does detract from the film's impact somewhat. We know from the outset why the women and children act so strangely, so it does mean that the amateur sleuthing by the new family is sort of wasted on us. But even taking this into account it's still an effective enough movie. The acting performances are pretty decent and there are some individual good moments, most of which involve scenes of the robotic replicas acting oddly. It's only towards the end where we see the sinister goings on behind the scenes. It's perhaps a pity there wasn't a little more made of this though as the ending itself is a bit too rushed for much of an impact. But all-in-all The Stepford Children is a decent enough TV chiller.

A chilling beginning to an ignored spin-off franchise

[jongruner · 10/10 · 28 January 2003]

You may have serious doubts about watching the third sequel to The Stepford Wifes, but this is an absolute classic. Much scarier in premise than the first, and very entertaining. It only got a video release here in the UK, but should be released worldwide for everyone to enjoy.

Please I want a copy of this Movie The Stepford Children

[tcampo23 · 10/10 · 23 June 2006]

I like many others saw this as a child and I loved it and it horrified me up until adulthood, I have been trying to find this movie and even been searching for it to play again on TV someday, since it originally played on USA networks. Does Anyone know where to buy this movie, or does anyone have it and would be willing to make a copy for me? Also does anyone know if there is a chance for it to be played on TV again? Maybe all of us fans should write a station in hopes of them airing it again. I don't think they did a good job of promoting this movie in the past because no one really knows about, people only know of the Stepford wives and Stepford husband movies. No one is familiar with the fact that there was a children version. Maybe they should also do a re-make of it since they seem to be doing that a lot lately with a lot of my favorite old thriller/horror flicks. Well if anyone has any input Please I Beg Of You write me with information. Thanks Taira [e-mail]

I need this film in my life!!!

[sjstobo22 · 10/10 · 22 January 2021]

As a fan of The Stepford movies and in particular this one why is it you can't even buyer it on any format?!? It's absurd as this is one out of all the Stepford films that stayed with me after watching it. Scared me as a child, I'm 40 now and I still would love to have this film. Can't remember much about it apart from the girl dressed as a cheerleader and had a meltdown in the house. I always will have a special place in my heart for this film.

"Stepford Children" Makes a Very Intelligent Point

[jill_frombklyn · 10/10 · 11 March 2007]

The Stepford Children, besides being a very good made for TV movie, shows the very disturbing result of indoctrination. It is quite a statement about how being made to act within the confines of what is considered "Good" behavior can destroy whatever it is that makes a person unique and an individual. I think that this is a movie that parents who want to maintain some semblance of the thought that loams within the hearts and minds of youngsters should watch with their children and discuss what the movie is saying. I don't know if that was in any way the intent of this movie but I have always been of the opinion that it is one of the best movie devices against the wish to have children conform to an unrealistic and domineering pretense of what is in the best interest of anyone other than that of the children themselves. I hope to one day see this movie on DVD. I am at the starting gate... waiting.