Twitter

Do you get frantic late-night phone calls from your mother about your checking account balance? Does your mom ask you questions about your health insurance plan? Is your mom writing on your Facebook wall, wondering if your recent profile picture indicates you have a drinking problem? Our moms always mean well, but sometimes they just need to chill out, right? Enter The Mom Whisperer: your helpful friend who will help you distract your mom through these troubling times with the best movies and TV shows proven to lull moms into a relaxed stupor. (White wine optional.)

Dear Mom Whisperer,

My mom emailed me this morning in a frantic. It turns out that she went to Salon Spice last night, but instead of seeing her usual stylist, Rick, she saw a new gal — Christie. Now, my mom usually pretty conservative when it comes to trying out new things,, so you can imagine my surprise when her early-morning email mentioned a “highlights situation.” Apparently, poor Christie went a little overboard with the highlights. My mom said that the girl was too nice to her and, bless her heart, she didn’t want to make her feel bad. But Mom has spent the morning crying at home, too embarrassed to go into the office. What can I recommend she watch to ease her pain?

—Concerned Kid With Perfect Bangs

Dear Perfect Bangs,

There are only two things moms love more than Meryl Streep: white wine and Robert Redford. Naturally, put all of those things together and your mom is in Heaven. I suggest she kick back with a glass of Chardonnay (the buttery the better) and turn on Out of Africa, the Sydney Pollack-directed epic based on Isak Dinesen’s autobiography of the same title. Streep plays Danish baroness Karen von Blixen-Finecke (Denison’s real name) who breaks out of her dull marriage of convenience when she has an affair with a big-game hunter in British East Africa. Robert Redford as a safari-leading and rugged philanderer teaching a Danish woman how to love? Your mom will lose it — especially when Redford washes Streep’s hair. This was pretty much the 50 Shades of Grey of the mid-’80s. (Find out where to stream Out of Africa on GoWatchIt.)

Dear Mom Whisperer,

I spent an hour on the phone with Mom last night after she watched a documentary about global warming. She seemed panicked, and really upset about our planet’s future. Then I got a lot of texts from my little sister this morning, saying that Mom has been separating the trash and has removed all of the incandescent light bulbs in the house. What can I do to calm her down?

—Ambivalent Environmentalist

Dear Ambivalent,

I’m impressed that it took her this long, but then again: your mom is a mom. I’m betting it wasn’t even An Inconvenient Truth that she watched, but probably, like, a half-hour special about how to prepare for the effects of global warming, right? Soon she’ll be stocking up on canned foods and rice, just in case. (Quinoa is probably too exotic for casual doomsday preppers.)

My suggestion? Have her watch Wall-E. Sure, it represents a post-apocalyptic Earth covered in trash, and it doesn’t represent a futuristic humanity in a very positive light. On the other hand, it’s got two ridiculously cute robots falling in love — set to songs from Hello, Dolly! Do you know who moms looooove? Young Michael Crawford. She’ll be too busy swooning to worry about her carbon footprint in no time! (Find out where to stream Wall-E on GoWatchIt.)

Dear Mom Whisperer,

Help! My mom accidentally watched two episodes of Girls last night because she wanted something to talk to me about other than The Good Wife, and this morning she’s threatened to drive 14 hours to my apartment in Brooklyn to clean the tub, take me shopping for clothes that don’t resemble what I wore in Kindergarten, and check my back for any tattoos. How do I stall her for a few hours while I figure out how I’ll break the news about my live-in boyfriend?

—Daughter Under Duress

Dear DUD,

I know your pain. Not a day goes by that I don’t count my lucky stars that my mother is too nervous to watch Looking, because then she’d surely realize that I’m living my life as a boring gay guy. (Also because I don’t want to explain what Grindr is.) I don’t envy you, because I think if my mother had a 22 year-old daughter, she would absolutely lose her mind if she caught an episode of Girls. The antidote, obviously, would be for your mom to watch Sex and the City again. Yeah, there’s a lot of sex, but it’s fun sex. Plus, all of those pretty clothes! Maybe you can convince your mom that your shitty little apartment looks more like Carrie’s than Hannah’s, and your weirdo artist boyfriend is actually something more like Aiden: hunky, making furniture, and not ejaculating all over you. Good luck! (Stream Sex and the City on HBO Go and Amazon Instant Video.)

Like what you see? Follow Decider on Facebook and Twitter to join the conversation, and sign up for our email newsletters to be the first to know about streaming movies and TV news!

Photos: Everett Collection