Our Family Wedding

Posted on July 14, 2010 at 8:26 am

As wilted as last weekend’s bridesmaid bouquet, “Our Family Wedding” manages to be offensive to African-Americans, Latinos, women, men, and sentient life forms of any kind. There may be a fine line between perpetuating stereotypes and making fun of them, but it is a line, and one that this film never makes it across. The only real connection the audience will have is with the actors, not the characters, as we ask ourselves over and over how so many talented people got stuck in this mess.

Every wedding is a culture clash, and there are plays, movies, and endless favorite family anecdotes about unexpected encounters with traditions and cuisine and even prejudices. But this story about the collision of cultures when a young woman of Mexican heritage marries an African-American has no real sense of its characters or their cultures and deteriorates quickly into superficial signifiers. The Frito Bandito has more ethnic sensitivity than anyone in this movie. A typically undernourished exchange has the groom’s father (a slumming Forest Whitaker) insisting that black traditions must be reflected in the ceremony but unable to remember any. There is no humor, no warmth, and no chemistry whatsoever between any of the characters, including the young couple we are supposed to be rooting for. And there’s no story — just emotional and sometimes literal mayhem in a lot of different locations.

Things that are supposed to be funny but are not include two different incidents of accidental Viagra taking, one involving the bride’s father and one involving a goat, a bartender who insists on being called a “mixologist,” excitable old ladies of both ethnic groups, a destroyed wedding cake, initial antagonism between the fathers over a towing incident that deteriorates into racial insults and subsequent bonding over getting drunk in a club (you don’t want to know the name of the drink they order from the mixologist) and dancing with lots of pretty girls. Things that are supposed to be endearing but are not include a best friends-turning to romance between Whitaker and the criminally underused Regina King and a rekindling of romance between the bride’s parents (a bland Carlos Mencia and Diana-Maria Riva). And it is truly unforgivable when there is a credit sequence series of photos suggesting yet another round of low-jinks ahead.

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Comedy Romance

Opening This Week: Comedy, Romance, and War

Posted on March 8, 2010 at 12:00 pm

Four big movies are opening this week. There’s a comic clash of cultures “Our Family Wedding” when “Ugly Betty’s” America Ferrara and “House of Payne’s” Lance Gross fall in love. “Twilight’s” Robert Pattinson and “Lost’s” Emilie de Ravin play characters who are both dealing with tragic loss who try to find solace in each other in “Remember Me.” “She’s Out of My League” is an outrageously raunchy comedy with Jay Baruchel (“Tropic Thunder”) as an airport security guy who falls for a dazzling girl (Alice Eve) and finds his biggest obstacle is his own insecurity (closely followed by learning to ignore the terrible advice of his friends). And in “The Green Zone,” Matt Damon reunites with Paul Greengrass, the director of the last two Bourne movies, for the fact-based story of an American officer who finds he cannot trust his intel about weapons of mass destruction and has to find out for himself.

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Opening This Week
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