At this point in time I believe Hollywood feels that the average film viewer has the memory of a goldfish (and that's an insult to goldfish everywhere). Every time I turn around I see another rehash of a film that has already been made before, over and over again. Yet some new spin is placed on it which makes it "fresh" . . . sure.
So here we have the film "Our Family Wedding" in which we get the "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" theme remade, horribly, and more racially charged.
It seems to me like Hollywood has no idea that integration happened and that people marry into different races all the time now, I myself come from a racially mixed family (Mexican and American) an no fuss was made over my parents marriage.
However, my parents weren't in a Hollywood film. In "Our Family Wedding" an African American man is engaged to a Mexican American woman and she has hidden that fact from her father (played by Carlos Mencia, in what may be his only funny role to date) because, as far as I can tell, the filmmakers are informing me Mexicans are racist against African Americans . . . wow.
On the other hand we have the soon to be groom who has informed his father of the situation, but due to a run in with the brides father (who owns a towing company an tows the other mans car) he can not stand the Mexican family at all.
Over the course of the 103 minute running time we get racially charged dialogue (the two fathers bickering back and forth and using words like "Bro" "Esse" "Vato" and "Cuz" to describe the other man) a cookie cutter dilemma of the bride bucking tradition and fighting with her fiancé, a Mexican grandmother fainting at the sight of her granddaughters African American fiancé (which is horribly racist), Viagra jokes (seriously? Viagra jokes?) and we top it all off with Forest Whitaker (who plays the Groom's father) being molested by a goat.
At this point, I honestly don't want to go on describing this film. The plot is the same old same old, nothing new is added and the acting is probably worse.
Strangely enough Charlie Murphy (Eddie's brother) is in here and is over acting so bad he is the worst racial stereotype of the bunch. Which is odd, because the film is a giant mess of insulting racial stereotypes.
I found this film insulting, not only to my Mexican heritage, but to my intelligence, and the intelligence of everyone involved.
I understand the allure of making films like these, but honestly this is a black eye for all those involved. Tasteless humor, tasteless racial stereotypes, and goats hopped up on Viagra. This film is just awful.
Score:
Acting = Terrible, seems like most of the people phoned in their roles, except for Carlos Mencia who I enjoyed here. . . oddly.
Directing = Nothing new or groundbreaking, just the same thing you'd expect from a film like this.
Script = Nauseating, racially charged dialogue and racial stereotypes do not make for a good film.
Final Thought = Skip this and go watch "Guess Who's Coming for Dinner" the 1967 Sidney Poitier film which started it all, and is fantastic, coming from a time of true racial tension.
1 comment:
Its funny you mentioned the scene where the grandma faints. That part struck me as kind of odd. She reacted to him like he was some sort of flesh eating demon monster! That was a little to much.
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