Despite the unfettered yammerings from the Twilight crowd, weddings remain not very interesting. Not really. No more so than a drive to work or a soccer match. Let me put it this way – you go by a park on the way home. Some kids are playing soccer. Do you stop and watch? Unless you’re a pedophile, you probably don’t. Do you go to a little league game for the baseball? Weddings are like that. It might be good stuff when you know the players, but without an invitation to the reception it’s not exactly the place to be.
People who make wedding movies generally know this, so they add something. Sometimes the something is lame and the script is awful, like Made of Honor. Sometimes the something is cute and there’s quirky musical numbers and it works, like My Best Friend’s Wedding. And sometimes, apparently, the thing is that the parties are comprised of black people, which is no more interesting, unfortunately, than if the couple and their respective families are white, Asian or plaid. And then Jumping the Broom takes a turn for
the worse. In order to generate controversy to get a plot moving, we got feuding mothers-in-law to be in Angela Bassett and Loretta Devine and a rich/poor thing straight out of whatever cliché works best for you.
And then we get to the biggest problem of all: when people are this awful to one another, I no longer care to see the standard happy ending. It strikes me as phony beyond belief. The night before the big day, the groom (Laz Alonso) actually rejects his bride in favor of The Guys. (Right before your wedding, dude? Really?) And just a few hours later, the bride (Paula Patton) uses an irrelevant piece of information to announce the wedding’s off. And, of course, the irrelevant news was delivered by her future mother-in-law in a deliberate attempt to hurt the rich family, her hosts.
Now after all that happens, do you want this couple to marry? I see nothing but pain in their future. There are trust issues and loyalty issues and in-law issues too numerous to count. Yeah, “wedding’s- off?-wedding’s-on” is a standard for the genre. Have you ever asked yourself what happens to the couples who get married just to send an audience home “happy?” Unless you find cougarism or Don Juan syndrome funny stuff, you probably won’t laugh much, either. I don’t know what that leaves. I suppose the couple is pretty. If that’s worth your two hours, by all means take it.
Rated PG-13, 112 Minutes
D: Salim Akil
W: Elizabeth Hunter and Arlene Gibbs
Genre: Wedding
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Pollyannas
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Men
Hey Jim, what’s the “irrelevant piece of information”? Don’t worry about spoilers, there’s no chance I’ll ever watch this.
IIRC, it’s some sort of revelation having to do with the bride’s family — like they’re not actually rich or something. It was a while ago and a complete non-sequitur turned into a plot point. At the end of the day, I’m much more interested in Paula Patton’s career than anything else in this film.