The Phantom Tollbooth - Movies Reviews Index


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Home Subscribe About Us Features News Album Reviews Movie Reviews Past Movies Movie Resources Concert Reviews Book Reviews Top 10 Contact Us	The Wedding Weekend (formerly Shut Up and Sing) Stars: David Alan Basche, Chris Bowers, Samrat Chakrabarti, David Harbour, Molly Shannon, Mark Feurstein, Liz Stauber, Camilla Thorsson, Elizabeth Reaser and Reg Rogers Director/Scriptwriter: Bruce Leddy Worldwide Film Entertainment Rating: R Running Length: 97 minutes www.TheWeddingWeekend.com Shades of “The Big Chill” (minus corpse) but we have a film of thirty-something’s getting together for a wedding of one of their own. In this case, as written and directed by Bruce Leddy, a group of guys sang together (think The Four Freshmen-style with more singers) through college. Actually, they were very good. Now, it is 15 years later and there are marriages, kids, divorces and the aging process. In other words, life is happening, so deal with it. These guys can’t. The film opens with the guys having their last group-sing on stage at college. The crowd adores them, they are in top form and the future is rosy. Now years ahead to the real world, and we see that one guy is fired but doesn’t know how to tell his wife, another guy fears a receding hairline so much he measures his forehead every day, yet another throws convention to the wind and wears a monk’s robe, while yet another can’t quite get anyone in the recording industry to give him the time of day. Then, comes the news that one of their own (Feurstein) is getting married in the wealthy Hampton's and wants the group to sing at his wedding. This requires some reconciliation, as there was a falling out, but hey, anything for the group and a wedding, right? Many couples now end up for the wedding weekend, all staying at one guys place, which reminded me of the cramped quarters shown in Steve Carell’s film, "Dan in Real Life." This sets the audience up for many situations such as the girls bashing the guys, the guys ogling girls when the wives aren’t around, frank sex talk at the dining table, and a few truths that hurt. One scene, where the guys end up in jail is strictly for laughs and shows that music is everywhere. Another is when a divorced guy tries to keep up jogging with the Swedish nanny. He’s out-classed from the first step. In fact, it is the love of music that brought the guys together in the first place and is the glue that still holds them together. They just love to sing. Writer/director Bruce Leddy has an uneven hand here. He’s at his best when he lets the situation flow rather than be obvious. Some scenes seem designed to let Molly Shannon do her worst impersonations of an obnoxious woman. Just place her in a bar and away she goes. Do all Swedish nannies (Camilla Thorsson) wear skimpy clothing? Do all babies barf on cue? When Leddy does let a situation flow, we get an encounter between husband and wife that almost goes into violence and someone sees that they’ve finally gone too far. Growing into full maturity takes time and sometimes it isn’t accomplished until one is heading into 40-year-old territory. If Leddy had tweaked the Shannon scenes a bit and allowed more talk among the women, the film would have balance. As it is, we get a picture of arrested development and wonder at why some people get married. As a side note (excuse the pun), the movie stars did not do their own singing. Instead, the eloquent tones were provided by “The Shutmen Singers”. They are composed of Sean Altman, Charlie Evett, Elliott Kerman, Kevin Weist, Wayne Wilking, and Michael Winther. Hopefully, there will be a soundtrack out soon. Copyright 2008 Marie Asner Submitted 6/6/08