Athletic Baby: Golf

Before we see the release of Quantum Physics Baby, Urdu for Babies, and Baby Backgammon, I think we should seriously call for a cease and desist on home video level montages of babies and toddlers that invariably run for 25-30 minutes for no compelling narrative reason whatsoever. As you might guess from the title, Athletic Baby: Golf features six-month-old babies and slightly older toddlers on the links confidently strutting up to the tee and firing off 300-yard hole-in-ones. Just joshing: most of these duffers can't even walk, let alone sink a 20-ft. putt (in fact, young non-ambulatory home viewers are liable to crawl away from this program with a vague sense that golf balls come in a variety of sizes and belong in the mouth). For those who think this is just another piece of fluff, a small handful of words and phrases appear onscreen, including "baby," "golf ball," "golf club," and "teamwork" (golf being such a well-known team sport), and creator Karen Foster offers some sincere boilerplate comments during a two-minute coda about promoting physical activity and building an early interest in popular sports. I don't mean to sound so flip, but I can't believe that all of these moms-turned-auteurs are unaware that this particular vein has been mined to exhaustion (we see a minimum of 10 new low-budget Baby Einstein knockoffs a month). Not recommended. Aud: P. (R. Pitman)