Friday, April 16, 2010
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Friday, April 16, 2010
MOVIE REVIEW
Death At A Funeral
It's Minstrel Show Time.
Do Your Thing, Guys.
Tracy Morgan and Chris Rock in "Death At A Funeral", which opened today across the U.S. and Canada.
Sony Pictures/Screen Gems
By
Omar P.L. Moore/PopcornReel.com
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Friday, April 16, 2010
A classic comedy of errors, "Death At A Funeral" steps in its own miserable
mess. It is funny, for about three or four minutes, but after that it has
nowhere to go down. And that's where it stays, literally mired in the muck
of bathroom humor.
Call it the death of comedy. Call it a funeral where common sense is about
to be buried.
And Neil LaBute directs this unfocused and scrambled egg-like caper. Mr.
LaBute, a strong writer whose plays and films on the misanthropic parts of human
beings tend to find more currency in their blunt and angry invectives than such
cinematic misfires as "The Wicker Man", "The Shape Of Things" (also his play)
and "Possession" is left to fend for others' material, namely Dean Craig's
script, which has its moments.
In scenarios strung together solely to keep the audience laughing and avoid any
excuse for terminating the film's idiocy and hysterics, Mr. Craig brings a
lunacy to the madcap that is blocks any notion that a story even exists in all
of this screaming and carrying on. The film is a showcase for tomfoolery
and mistrelsy.
Just three years ago, the original "Death Of A Funeral" had laughs a plenty, and
one cast member from that film, Peter Dinklage, is back to contribute to the
latest mayhem. He gets his day in the sun but it's all in the service of
clowning and hijinks, which the film has plenty of already, thanks mainly to
Tracy Morgan (who continues to sink lower and lower after "Cop Out") and James
Marsden, who parades around naked because he has to. (That's apparently
what the script said, I guess.)
This installment of scatological horror takes place in Los Angeles, and everyone
is gathered for the funeral of Chris Rock's Aaron character. Mr. Rock
plays straight man to all the chaos around him, while everyone else just loses
their heads. It's difficult not to lose your mind in the absurdity while
watching this film. You're either sure you're going insane because you
can't believe the sadness of this painful comedy, or because you've been forced
to laugh to keep from crying.
With: Martin Lawrence, Zoe Saldana, Regina Hall, Loretta Devine, Luke Wilson,
Danny Glover, Columbus Short, Keith David.
"Death At A Funeral" is rated R by the Motion Picture Association Of America for
language, drug content and some sexual humor. The film's running time is one hour and
33 minutes.
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Read more movie reviews and stories from Omar
here.
Read Omar's "Far-Flung Correspondent" reports for America's pre-eminent Film
Critic Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times -
here
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