Death at a Funeral Review

Death at a Funeral is a remake of the 2007 Frank Oz directed British movie by the same name. With that being said, as a movie critic, it is required by our law to say the original is better; to not do so would result in lashings and beatings from Roger Ebert. However, I’m going to be the rebel here and avoid the sentence completely, and simply say the two had very different styles of humor. Are you going to find this movie funny? I guess you’re just going to have to keep reading to find out.

Death at a Funeral stars Chris Rock, Martin Lawrence, Zoe Saldana, Luke Wilson, Tracy Morgan, James Marsden, and Danny Glover to name a few of the many stars. Now, as a Sci-Fi fan, I was simply thinking they got Ney’Tiri, Cyclops, and Shepherd Book all in one movie, so imagine my surprise when I sat down to watch a ridiculous comedy that actually had a bit of heart.

The movie is about Aaron (Rock) dealing with his fathers funeral, and all of his crazy relatives that show up. You would think they are there to pay their respects to their fallen friend, but almost everyone has an ulterior motive, which leads to wacky shenanigans, a crazy midget, drug use, and plenty of poop jokes. Aaron, however, is a conservative guy, who seems to only want the sense of family, and shelters the entire burden in the film, which, on paper is easily identifiable.

For me, I thought James Marsden’s character was the best part. He was the boyfriend of Zoe Saldana, who was slipped a hallucinogen and spends the entire funeral completely high, which ends up with him naked on the roof, in front of everyone and is proof that Marsden needs to do more comedy work. The other star was Danny Glover, as the crotchety uncle. He was great as the guy who was “way too old for this shit.” There were other adequate performances from Saldana and Luke Wilson, but everyone else seemed to not have much interest in the lines. Rock just seemed to have no sense of comedic timing, and his lines just felt like they had zingers thrown in at the last minute with no sense of timing, and a very dry delivery. Martin Lawrence was his typical self, not deviating at all, so if you think that is a good thing, you’ll enjoy it; for me, however, it seemed tired.

The original movie didn’t do well because the overall census was that it was too dry and straight laced to be funny, and too crazy of a concept to be a drama. The remake makes it very clear that it is trying to be a comedy, and felt like it was over compensating a bit. There were plenty of parts I laughed at, and the audience seemed to eat it up, but sadly, stoned midgets and poop jokes don’t have the same effect they used to on me, and as a result, I only found this movie slightly enjoyable, but overall forgettable. If you love the simpler things in comedy, however, you will definitely enjoy this movie.

EDITORS NOTE: This appeared on Creative Loafing's website. Check it out HERE!