New Funeral a Deathly Comedy
One of the things I really adored about director Frank Oz and writer Dean Craig’s 2007 independent British farce Death at a Funeral was just how effortless it all seemed. Sure it dragged on a bit too long and yes it didn’t quite know what to do with itself at the end but the ride was just so ebulliently foul-mouthed and hysterical I didn’t really seem to care. It was a light bit of froth that knew what it was and had a good idea about how it was going to get that done, and even if it wasn’t perfect it still offered up enough witty delights to make the comedic ride an enjoyable one.
Martin Lawrence, Peter Dinklage, Chris Rock and Tracey Morgan in Screen Gems' Death at a Funeral
Craig, now teaming up with hit-and-miss filmmaker Neil LaBute (In the Company of Men, The Wicker Man), has now re-written his script revolving things around an African American household and cast Chris Rock (who also produces) and Martin Lawrence as the two feuding brothers forced to make amends after startling revelations come to light during their father’s funeral. But while the bones remain the same the tone just doesn’t translate, and other than some superbly funny bits here and there this second time around I can’t say I enjoyed myself near as completely.
My main issue is that things just don’t seem a natural this time around. There is a staged quality to the film that kept me from being able to immerse myself within it. The disparate cast of characters trying their best to deal with all the individual bits of chaos affecting them didn’t have that easygoing shimmer, and where the Brits did a great job of making things look easy the actors here end up doing just the opposite. Everything within this purposely convoluted comedy feels forced and hard, everyone involved bugging out their eyes, arching their brows and jutting out their jaws calling way too much attention to the theatricality of their performances than even close to necessary.
It is an outstanding cast, I must admit. While I’m not a huge fan of the acting skills of either Rock or Lawrence both do better here than I’d have expected them to. Tracey Morgan, an actor I usually can’t stand, winningly steals scenes left and right, and with Danny Glover, Regina Hall, Ron Glass, Loretta Devine and Keith David all on hand there is definitely a lot that works here. Sadly, Luke Wilson didn’t do all that much for me proving to be more annoying than amusing, while the usually reliable Zoë Saldaña phones in the majority of her performance and other than one great rooftop moment I got the feeling she didn’t even want to be on the set let alone in the actual motion picture.
I haven’t mentioned either Peter Dinklage or James Marsden for a reason. In the case of the former, he doesn’t do a darn thing different here than he did in the original, and while he’s still a great actor this felt more like an excuse to pick up a paycheck more than it did anything else. As for the latter, he’s absolutely great, throwing himself into his role with furious abandon. The problem for me is that his role was so superbly played by Alan Tudyk in the 2007 film I kept daydreaming about what he did in Oz’s version more than I was watching Marsden try and make the character his own. It’s my own bias, yes, but one that kept me from fully embracing the actor all the same even though I appreciated his fearless efforts.
It should be apparent by now I’m not going to go into the plot. For one thing, there isn’t a reason to. The movie is a multi-character farce set during the funeral of a beloved family patriarch whose two sons don’t see eye-to-eye on numerous issues, not the least of which is what to do about what is to them a stunning revelation made by a diminutive stranger about their father. But that’s just a small portion of what goes wrong during the funeral, and for those unfamiliar with the original to say more would by simply unfair.
There is enough about this new Death at a Funeral that I think many are probably going to enjoy themselves. Craig’s script still has more than its share of delights, and I do like how effortless the transition from one to the other has seemed to be for the writer. I just couldn’t help but feel like the spark of ingenuity that made that earlier effort sing now seems to be missing, and where the British did all this with an underplayed sincerity I couldn’t help but warm to this one felt so often far too in my face for my liking. In the end, I just didn’t believe in the scenario or in the characters as completely, that in essence its own death knell keeping me from reveling in all the comedic histrionics.
Film Rating: êê (out of 4)
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