| Family Weekend | |
| Director: | Benjamin Epps |
| Starring: | Kristin Chenoweth Matthew Modine Olesya Rulin Joey King Eddie Hassell Adam Saunders Robbie Tucker Chloe Bridges Shirley Jones |
| Producer: | Adam Saunders Chris Aronoff |
| Music: | Russ Howard III Mateo Messina |
| Cinematography: | Christopher Norr |
| Editing: | Benjamin Epps Colleen Halsey |
| Studio: | Footprint Features The Bedford Falls Company |
| Distributor: | ARC Entertainment |
| Runtime: | 106 minutes |
| Country: | United States |
| Language: | English |
Family Weekend is a 2013 American comedy-drama film directed by Benjamin Epps and starring Kristin Chenoweth, Matthew Modine, Olesya Rulin, Joey King, Eddie Hassell, Adam Saunders, Chloe Bridges and Shirley Jones.
Emily (Olesya Rulin) is a speed rope-jumping champion of her school and general overachiever. She is praised by one love-lorn boy at school (though she is mocked by other students) for her achievements, but her family does not care about her jump roping success.
On Friday, Emily wins the regional championship in speed rope-jumping and moves on to the state championship to be held the coming weekend. She looks at the audience only to find nobody from her family cheering for her. She confronts her family at home during a family dinner, but her mother Samantha (Kristin Chenoweth), father Duncan (Matthew Modine), brother Jackson (Eddie Hassell), and sister Lucinda (Joey King) all continue to be wrapped up in themselves and ignore her plea to take her jump-roping seriously.
Inspired by an Animal Planet segment her possibly-autistic younger brother Mickey (Robbie Tucker) is watching on treating Tasmanian devils by sedating the creatures so treatment can be administered, as a desperate attempt to bring the family back together, Emily secretly drugs her parents' wine with her mother's sedatives. She then binds each of them to a chair. With help from her siblings, psychiatrist grandmother GG (Shirley Jones), and her school friend and neighbor Kat (Chloe Bridges), during the weekend, she attempts to teach her parents how to parent.
While her father soon succumbs, praising her, her mother still unconvinced, scolds her often. After an emotional one-to-one with her mother that brings tears from Emily, she ultimately succeeds in both bringing her parents back together and causing all the members of the family to realize that everyone in the family is important and needs support.
By the time Deputy Tucker and Officer Reyes show up Sunday morning due to videos Kat had put online about the kidnapping, her parents and the neighbor have changed their attitudes and help Emily escape to get to the state finals. During her jump competition, all her family finally appear at the championship to cheer her on. She momentarily stops jumping in surprise when she sees her family, but still wins second place. Deputy Tucker and Officer Reyes also show up and arrest her for having attacked her mother's co-worker/faux-boyfriend at her home who had inadvertently interrupted her kidnapping plot.
Emily is later seen at a youth correctional facility with her jump-rope keeping her company, as her family comes to bring her back home upon her sentence expiring.