I have to admit this tack was new – and almost refreshing. I’ve seen about a dozen miserable parodies over the past few years: Vampires Suck, Fifty Shades of Black, Scary Movie N (where N>4) to name just a few. What did they all have in common? A mountain of tremendously ill-considered and pathetic “jokes.” Meet the Blacks has put an end to this trend with a seemingly new form of film – the jokeless parody. And while the film was piss-poor, it did have the advantage (for the most part) of not trying to make me laugh. I appreciated this a great deal.
Mind you, there were still attempts at humor here anmd poor ones at that – Mike Tyson dressed as a birthday party entertainer (I dunno, either. Something from the clown family) for instance. Nope, it wasn’t funny and never will be, but often the direction wasn’t even trying to tell a joke, which made Meet the Blacks feel like a regular old shitty film – one that just happened to be based on The Purge under a less serious atmosphere. Maybe “feature length homage” is a better term for what this film actually is.
Mike Epps. Oh, God. Mike Epps. Has he ever been in anything good? Wait. Just take a second. Think carefully. I’m gonna go to imdb right now. OK, I see he was in The Hangover. Don’t remember who he was, but, well, wait. Here’s something: Roll Bounce. I kinda liked Roll Bounce. What’s that? Forty films and the best you have to show are forgettable appearances in Roll Bounce and two Hangover films. Was I making a claim that Mike Epps = bad film? I am clearly in error. This career speaks for itself.
What Mike Epps can’t do is act. I’m sure part of this was the Deon Taylor direction, but I don’t actually know what Epps was going for in any scene. And this is a parody of a horror film. Whaddaya think, Mike, scared? Brave? Lethargic? Haughty? Bloated? Ecstatic? Bored? Couldn’t tell you. Mike Epps is all over the map with a multitude of indecisive expressions. As Carl Black, the leader of the newest Beverly Hills resident Blacks, he has moved his bunch from Chicago for “a better life.” Unfortunately, he has apparently done so on Purge Day, the twelve
hour period when all crime, including mopery, is legal.
It would seem that the former dope thief/stoolie Carl Black pissed off every single person in Chi-Raq from Ryne Sandberg to Bad, Bad LeRoy Brown, and while in his new digs, his new pissed off neighbors have the flimsier excuse of simply detesting having a black man on their block. Bottom line is everybody on Purge Day is out to kill Carl Black. The joke is they’re just really bad at it. At least I think that’s the joke. It’s worth note that Carl himself seems unconcerned about Purge Day, imagining that his Beverly Hills locale will alleviate the problem by itself. And that’s after having to be reminded that IT IS Purge Day, as if this wouldn’t be foremost on the minds of every.single.person in the country, if not the world.
I’ve already spent far too much time on this film. In a nutshell – parody of The Purge, but in 80% of the cases where a similar movie would go for a painfully unfunny laugh, Meet the Blacks did nothing. While I appreciated said inaction, the void was filled by Mike Epps, who is equally as capable of entertainment as I am of playing in the NHL.
Meet Carl Black, hard at “work”
Never met a man he couldn’t irk
There’s his wife, the new one I think
Something to look at when this film starts to stink
Teen daughter Black seems a bit thick
Why, girl, why, are you hiding a dick?
The youngest Black pretends he’s undead
Were I you, I’d pretend the opposite instead
And then cousin Black, a straight-up hood
When not wankin’ to th’ missus, he’s up to no good
The Purge has come and all Blacks must flee
Shame they don’t die; shorter film = glee
Rated R, 94 Minutes
D: Deon Taylor
W: Nicole DeMasi, Deon Taylor
Genre: The jokeless parody
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Mike Epps’ real family … maybe?
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Movie goers
