A Madea Family Funeral Review
PG-13: Crude sexual content, language, and drug references throughout
Lionsgate, Tyler Perry Studios
1 Hr and 49 Minutes
Writer/Dir: Tyler Perry
Cast: Tyler Perry, Cassi Davis, Patrice Lovely, Jen Harper, Derek Morgan, Quin Walters, Ciera Payton, Aeriél Miranda, David Otunga, Kj Smith, Vermyttya Erahn, Courtney Burrell, and Rome Flynn
It’s that time of the year again. A new Tyler Perry movie. Now, Tyler Perry’s most notable creation Madea is coming to an end. He’s hanging up the wig and a part of me is a bit sad about it. Granted, she had worn her welcome once 2012’s Madea’s Witness Protection was released, but she was a huge part of my upbringing. Plus, seeing this with an audience feels so authentic. I mean, once you find yourself sitting next to a big woman with long clip-on nails, pink hair, and her 4-year-old son, you know you’re at a Tyler Perry movie.
A joyous family reunion turns into a hilarious nightmare as MADEA and the crew travel to backwoods Georgia and unexpectedly plan a funeral, which threatens to reveal sordid family secrets.
Compared to how the last two Madea movies felt creatively bankrupt (aka stemmed from a joke by Chris Rock in his own movie), A Madea Family Funeral actually feels inspired. From a comedic standpoint and its central premise, the film is as absurd as you’d expect a Perry movie to be. For this being the final Madea movie, it’s fitting how much it works in the same way as her first appearance which was in the play I Can Do Bad All by Myself. The drama present in this entry is trashy and has a bit of fun in the same vein as Perry’s theater plays. Tyler Perry is so lucky this came out around the same time as the Khloe Kardashian/Tristan Thompson scandal because the drama in the story is nearly as trashy as the situation everyone is tuning into now. It is so in sync and entertaining to watch and play through.
If you’ve grown up with Perry as I have, you tend to become familiar with the same generic formula he just loves to recycle. Many times have I criticized his ineptness to try something new, even to the extent of getting frustrated with his previous feature, Nobody’s Fool. But the reason why I let this pass is because this bears a formula that is a bit nostalgic. Believe it or not, this is Perry going back to his roots with his stageplays. From scenes of tea being spilled, truth bombs being dropped, clapbacks, characters having no subtlety or common sense to their actions, and that speech at the end delivered by the mother or Madea delivering a valuable lesson like an afterschool special... that is the Madea I grew up with and I haven’t seen that in a very long time. It’s recycled as fuuuuuck but made me reminiscent of the Madea’s Big Happy Family play. We’ve seen Perry do this before, but not on a big screen format. I’m kind of disappointed that nobody really broke out in song. All we got instead were scenes that never end, and when they do they’re not even completed.
As fundamentally flawed and trashy as it is, the film harks back to classic Perry in his roots. It kind of had me nostalgic of the days of my childhood where I used to put on the bootleg copies of his plays that my family had and watch them together. Those were good times.
I feel like Tyler Perry may be the first filmmaker to create his own little cinematic universe and be so inconsistent with it. I dare someone to make a goddamn family tree of the Simmons family because Perry is always introducing a shit ton of new relatives to Madea and nobody knows who the hell they are. This is the LAST Madea film and Perry decides to give Brian and Madea another sibling named Heathrow. Like, where the fuck was he for the past *counts fingers*… 15 years! The only gimmick that Perry gives him is that he speaks through an electrolarynx and is paraplegic, but when it comes to his character it’s pretty much Joe in a wheelchair. He’s old and horny and you’re just there thinking: “what is the purpose of this character who was never introduced until now?”
Has anyone noticed the drop of quality of these movies over the years? After Madea’s Witness Protection everything just became so telegraphic. Is it because of the entire switch to digital camera Hollywood did in 2013? I’ve become accustomed to the sitcomish quality of these Madea movies now, but damn, I would like a little more effort with his productions!
Now, while the film’s atmosphere delivers a welcoming nostalgia, I will admit this shit is still a mess. It’s marginally better than the last three Madea movies, but it would’ve been better if Perry went to stand-up classes and learned how to craft his jokes or learned when to yell cut. Every scene is a prolonged one and Perry doesn’t know how to cut because he’s onscreen ad libbing to no end. The movie is 109 minutes when it could've been cut down to 89 minutes. It happens to move at a relatively fast pace, but each scene drags to no avail and when it’s time to cut to the next scene, it just jumps ahead without letting that scene complete. There is a Goldilocks situation present here, for the scenes either run too long are cut too short.
You have this terribly written re-enactment of racist police criminality (during a time where actual movies are making strong arguments about the subject) in a long sequence where Brian and the old folks gang get pulled over by police and it goes way over-the-top. The only funny thing about the sequence is seeing how hammy the white cop gets because you see his veins pop. Every 4th or 5th joke in a scene works, for most of the humor is repetitious. The same jokes are made in every movie: Madea is a thug, Joe is a pimp, Aunt Bam loves weed, Hattie is horny.
It’s like clockwork. Besides the repetition, many of the jokes are a dud, but the ones that do work are hella effective. There are several laugh-out-loud moments that are funny in context to the absurd story. Graaaanted, again, it’s in the same lines of Death at a Funeral (both the Black and British versions) in concept, but it’s Perry’s humor that makes it… Perry.
The drama is garbage as well. First off, you have these characters nobody’s heard of in recycled problems that involve obvious cheating and people who don’t know self-love. And he is still inept to the concept of subtlety where people are so guilty or children aren’t ever nonchalant about their actions and don’t cover up their tracks. Soap operas have more subtlety than Tyler Perry, but he knows how to dive deep into trash like a dumpster diver. I don’t know the band of these new characters, but like soap operas, I’m here for the drama and not the characters. If you can enjoy the film on that level, then more power to you.
If is was the last Madea movie, I would’ve wished for some type of farewell because this was a character Perry has done for most of his career. Some sort of thank you for all the support would’ve been gracious. I’m not saying it needed to be HTTYD sad, but just a serviceable goodbye.
Even when the film finishes, it’s on an incomplete note as it fades to black on a punchline.
Oh well…
A Madea Family Funeral is as generic and bland as you’d expect a Tyler Perry movie to be, but it delivers on a nostalgic atmosphere that will give hardcore fans the fun final moment with Madea that they deserve.
Rating: 2/5 | 40%
Super Scene: Hospital Secrets
