This techique explains why this week, I ended up seeing the newest Tyler Perry flick, Why Did I Get Married. Didnt know what it was about basically and just asked the ticket salesperson if it was a comedy. She said it was but that it had "good life lessons".
This discription not sounding too off-setting, I went on to see the movie. I cant really say I regret seeing it, however, there were some drawbacks. Drawbacks that I "felt" but had to read some other critiques in order to understand exactly what it was that was bothering me.
First of all, the focal group for this movie is very definitely an African American audiance. This fact that was strongly apparent by the fact that the number of non-Black people in the audiance was extremely low, in a FULL theater. All of the main characters belong to that demographic and the few non-Black's in the movie are given very short shift. As one critic observed, Tyler Perry's depiction of African American characters is really right on. However, whites and gays especailly are not depicted with any sort of depth. (incidentially two of the three white characters that
I can remember were also gay men and very very one dimensional) I would suggest, however, that even his Black characters in this movie lack a certain depth. They seem to all be very long suffering, loyal and committed people. Well, except for the one or two "villians" in the piece, which are OBVIOUS villians. There is very little nuance. Not to give too much away for those that may decide to give it a chance anyway, a decision I encourage by the way, the story is about 4 couples that go on retreat once a year to evualate and reconnect in their relationships. One is a psychologist, one a doctor, and one a very very ambitious woman, altought I tend to forget what kind of business she was in.
All but one of these relationships ended up re-committing and whatever problems they had, and there were some really substantial ones, were solved in some way. The one case that didnt follow the pattern was pretty cut and dried as to who the "good one" was and who the "bad ones", and the "bad one" got their comeuppance in the end, while the other party gets their reward.
All that is very good except that it is not exactly how real life is. In real life, the "good one" and the "bad one" are not, in my opinion, that clear cut. There are couples that are perfectly fine as individuals, just not good together. That was certainly not the case here. The take that this is a movie, not real life, is a good defense. Except that I found the entire movie to be almost cloyingly religious in tone, and very simplistic.
The movie has a great cast in Tyler Perry, and Janice Jackson in particular and has a lot of humour and is worth a see, however for more nuanced, and in depth drama, look elsewhere.