Thursday Movie Picks: Journalists/Reporters for Print/TV

Best Man Holiday

Directed by Malcolm D. Lee. 

2013. Rated R, 123 minutes. 

Cast: 

Taye Diggs 

Morris Chestnut 

Nia Long 

Terrence Howard 

Melissa De Sousa 

Monica Calhoun 

HaroldPerrineau 

Regina Hall 

Sanaa Lathan

When last we saw our gang of friends, way back in 1999, things culminated in a beautiful wedding for Lance (Chestnut) and Mia (Calhoun). All these years later, they've all moved on to bigger and better things. We pick up the story with Lance and Mia inviting the whole crew over to their place for the week of Christmas. Everyone is on board, no problem, except Harper (Diggs). It turns out things between he and Lance haven't been so good in the intervening years. The events of The Best Man, seems to have irreparably damaged their friendship. Nonetheless, he agrees to go because he has an ulterior motive. His last few books have flopped. His next one may not see the light of day. He has also lost his teaching job at NYU, his wife Robin (Lathan) is pregnant with their first child, and the bills are piling up. At the urging of his agent, he plans on writing a biography on Lance, the football hero. One slight problem. He hasn't actually mentioned this to Lance. The playing out of this situation and a number of others ensues.

In case you were wondering, the entire cast does indeed reprise their roles from the original. Julian (Perrineau) really did marry Candy (Hall), the stripper. Though she no longer does that sort of thing, her past comes back to haunt them in a big way. Jordan (Long) is a media mogul of sorts, still incredibly driven and beautiful. I just had to mention the beautiful part. I mean, it is Nia Long, dammit. I digress. She is also still single, but dating Brian (Cibrian), the only newcomer and only Caucasian. Both of these matter for at least a few minutes. Quentin (Howard) is a successful ad man and still a mischevious button pusher. Finally, Shelby (De Sousa) is a reality TV star more concerned with building her brand than anything else. In true sequel fashion, each person plays a bigger, badder version of themselves. Their most memorable traits take center stage and never leave. In general, this works. The one issue is that leves the characters with a flatter feel to them.

Even if the players aren't as well-rounded as they once were, they are still a fun bunch to be around. They make us laugh on a fairly consistent basis as each member of the ensembl, usually two at a time, takes turns in the spotlight. When their turn is done, they fade into the background just enough to still be seen until they are either tasked to give counsel to one of the others, or take over the proceedings once more. It essentially becomes a game of hot potato with the cast quickly passing our attention our their circle.

All of that tossing us around is where the movie gets into a bit of trouble. Director Malcolm D. Lee might be a world class juggler. However, even the best have limits. At times, it feels as if he's reached his, but threw one more ball in the air anyway. To his credit, he ties the stoires together organically and in a manner that is never confusing. It can just feel as if the system is dangerously close to overloading. Thankfully, a cast which is more than game makes it all a joy to watch. They are uniformly excellent. Even so, Terrence Howard and Melissa De Sousa stand out as doing particularly nice work. They help maintain a sense of fun, even as things start to get heavy during the final act.

This last portion of Best Man Holiday is where it might lose some of you. Though what's going on with Mia is telegraphed practically from the moment people start arriving at her house, the movie still shifts hard into tear-jerker mode. It pulls mightily at our heartstrings. Judging by the crowd I watched with, including my wife and a cousin of hers, it's effective. If, like me, you're not prone to crying over movies, it can start to feel very manipulative. What was a fun, occasionally raunchy ensemble comedy devolves into a profit driver for Kleenex. I say this fully realizing that people who do cry over movies are much more inclined to love the films that move them to tears. Personally, I like it a good deal. I just don't love it.

Baggage Claim

Directed by David E. Talbert.

2013. Rated PG-13, 96 minutes.

Cast:

Paula Patton

Derek Luke

Jill Scott

Adam Brody

Taye Diggs

Jennifer Lewis

Boris Kodjoe

Trey Songz

Djimon Hounsou

Lauren London

Christina Milian

La La Anthony

When Montana (Patton) learns that her younger sister Sheree (London) is getting married soon, and before she is, her world is sent spiraling out of control. Not only is Montana not married, she doesn’t have any prospects. This is a big problem. She’s been raised to believe that she simply is not a lady if she’s not married by thirty. That her sister will tie the knot first is a travesty of epic proportions. At the very least she wants to find Mr. Right in time to escort her to the wedding which is a mere thirty days away. Obviously, this is a daunting task, but it helps that she is an airline stewardess. However, rather than meeting men as she normally would in her profession, her work buddies talk her into what they think is a genius plan. They will track down her ex-boyfriends as they travel to see if any of them has developed into the man of her dreams since they broke up.

Let’s just get this out of the way, first. That is an astonishingly dumb idea. Setting aside the fact that these are guys that she’s already found out were not “the one” for one reason or another, the execution of this plan is idiotic, at best. It involves her dropping everything the second her pals call her to let her know one of these guys is on a  flight, high-tailing it to the airport to make said flight, and trying to instantly rekindle the flames. Yes, she always makes it to the plane just in time, but as you might imagine, these guys have the same problems that caused their break-up the first time around.

In the midst of all the chaos that is her life, she has one stable relationship with a straight man. She grew up with the guy who lives across the hall. In fact, they are best friends. His name is William Wright (Luke). Hey, wait a sec…let me just repeat his name in case you somehow dodged that sledgehammer. William Wright. WRIGHT. Uh-huh.

The overwhelming majority of romantic comedies are inane, predictable affairs. This is certainly no exception. The next moment is always precisely what you think it’s going to be. It simply runs down the rom-com checklist in order and on time. This strict adherence to the formula drains the life out of most jokes. It’s hard to laugh when you already know the punchline.

Likewise, it is difficult to get wrapped up in the dilemmas on the screen when the performances of them are so plastic. Paula Patton normally does solid work. Here, I can see her ‘acting’ which is empirical evidence that the performer is doing a bad job. Her voice has the fake quality of a person trying but failing to prove that they are honest. The rest of the cast seems to be in a contest to see who can be the most photogenic. They take turns reciting their lines through the pearly whites of their megawatt smiles, just like in the pic above. Don’t get me wrong, it’s an impressive looking group of people and an accomplished bunch of actors, but to this particular production they bring all the depth of a cookie sheet. The only characters with any spunk whatsoever are Montana’s partners in romantic crime: Sam (Brody), her gay male friend, and Gail (Scott), her busty and perpetually horny gal pal. Sam is a walking stereotype, but at least he gets most of the movie’s best lines. Gail gets the best gestures and is the most interesting person in the movie. Love her or hate her, she has a zest for life and an independence sorely missing from the protagonist. A better movie could probably have been made about her.

Everything I’ve mentioned thus far makes Baggage Claim a bad movie. Regardless of how terribly they go down, all of these elements are rather innocuous. They are things that render this fit for the skyward reaching junk pile of rom-coms, all of which are indistinguishable from the rest. However, right from the start this is a potentially damaging film. It repeatedly and explicitly pushes the idea that a woman absolutely, positively must have a husband or she is a failure at life. Sam impotently tries to dissuade Montana from this notion once or twice. When Montana herself comes to understand the fallacy of this ideal, the movie’s own finale completely undermines her. Honestly, it’s baffling that she believed this in the first place given the fact that marriage hasn’t actually worked for her own mother (Lewis), the one pushing this whole mindset. Mom’s been married five times, and even Montana understands she marries simply for the sake of being married. This is not a model to live by. The entire thing is an exercise in archaic thought. Sure, we all want someone to grow old with. Branding someone worthless for having yet found that person is backwards, at best, and anti-feminist, if not downright misogynist, at worst.

To blame for this atrocity we have writer/director David E. Talbert, or Tyler Perry 2.0, as I like to call him. He’s taken essentially the same path to Hollywood as Mr. Madea. Talbert wrote and directed his own plays which he successfully toured around the nation targeting African-American female audiences. His work, that I’ve seen anyway, has a similar mix of Christianity and secularism, is thematically similar, but tends to be a bit more risqué. This holds true as their work translates to the big screen. Unfortunately, Talbert fails to realize that the time for labeling single women near (or in) their thirties as barren old maids has long since past. It’s also a terrible message for the young ladies in the audience. I’m not normally a cinematic moralist. I don’t need movies to have positive messages for me to enjoy them, but I don’t like to be brow-beaten, either. This is so persistent with its assertions, it galls me to no end.

MY SCORE: 2/10