Our Family Wedding

admin — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 16:01:00 +0000

Welcome to the new post-racial America, where at long last African Americans and Latinos can star together in a major studio movie every bit as crappy as anything White people have ever done. Our Family Wedding is... notable only for the racial composition of the cast… (Corey Hall, Metro Times)

Cultures…clash in [this] cartoonish feature about the nuptials of a Mexican American daddy’s girl (America Ferrera) and an African American doctor (Lance Gross)… Plodding predictably through family introductions…the movie leaves no racial stereotype or stale joke unturned. (Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times)

Lucia and Marcus make a charming couple…[If director Rick Famuyiwa had focused this film] just [on] them, it might [have been] a sweet little romance. But because Marcus is Black and Lucia is Mexican American, this strained comedy focuses on the culture clash between the two families—particularly the fathers [Forest Whitaker and Carlos Mencia]. The script…runs through the dumbest racial stereotypes and idiotic sight gags… You'll wish Lucia and Marcus had eloped and taken you with them. (Sean P. Mean, Salt Lake Tribune)

While it's true that culture clashes have long been a staple element of wedding movies, Our Family Wedding… lazily [recycles] from The In-Laws, Meet the Parents, and My Big Fat Greek Wedding… (Jason Anderson, Toronto Star)

Our Family Wedding manages to be offensive to African Americans, Latinos, women, men, and sentient life forms of any kind…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. (Nell Minow, Beliefnet)

At this point, you are probably wondering why I chose to extensively quote other movie reviewers rather than come up with something on my own. To be honest, I found myself in a situation where I thought I was going to rip this film to shreds by drawing some fresh and original conclusion, only to find out that a kajillion other more experienced and articulate people had done it first—and better.

These other reviewers are absolutely right in their assessments of Our Family Wedding; the fact they represent such a diverse range of media and geographical areas makes their opinions seem even more correct to me. To add insult to injury, this movie doesn’t even rise to the level of it’s-so-bad-it’s-good, as it telegraphs all its (weak) punches. Seriously, what made the three screenwriters think that a goat eating Viagra was funny? For that matter, when was the last time you saw a goat in a comedy that didn’t eat something it wasn’t supposed to eat?

I just saved you a lot of aggravation. You owe me. (Kam Williams, The Sly Fox)

Written by: Ebony Edwards-Ellis, March 15th 2010

Rick Famuwiya

Our Family Wedding