Reviewed by: Brian C. Johnson
CONTRIBUTOR
Moral Rating: | Offensive |
Moviemaking Quality: |
|
Primary Audience: | Adults Teens |
Genre: | Comedy Drama |
Length: | 1 hr. 45 min. |
Year of Release: | 2011 |
USA Release: |
April 22, 2011 (wide—2,100+ theaters) DVD: August 30, 2011 |
Raising one’s children to love God and each other
What is true love—a feeling, an emotion, or an action?
What does true love look like in a relationship? How do you know when you have found it?
Family secrets
Bitterness and unforgiveness
Family infighting
What does the Bible say about marriage?
Disobeying the law
Dealing drugs
Tough love
Featuring |
Tyler Perry … Madea/Joe Loretta Devine … Shirley Cassi Davis … Aunt Bam Shannon Kane … Kimberly Isaiah Mustafa … Calvin Rodney Perry … Harold Tamela J. Mann … Cora David Mann … Brown Teyana Taylor … Sabrina See all » |
Director |
Tyler Perry |
Producer |
The Tyler Perry Company Ozzie Areu … executive producer Michael Paseornek … executive producer Tyler Perry … producer Roger M. Bobb … producer Reuben Cannon … producer Joseph P. Genier … co-producer |
Distributor |
“I’ll make your family an offer it can’t refuse.”
Watch out y’all… Madea’s back and she’s as mad as ever! Tyler Perry has kept his promise to his own mother (she passed away recently and asked that he keep Madea around, despite his expressed desire to retire the wig and body suit).
Those who have been fans of Tyler Perry since his breakout career in stage plays have watched Madea’s over-the-top antics over and over (and over and over and over and over). Her acerbic language and definitely rude behavior was funny then, but it wears thin after hearing the same jokes and same dysfunctional family plotlines time and time again.
In “Madea’s Big Happy Family,” Tyler Perry stars and directs the adaptation of his latest popular stag play by the same name. Fans of the play, honestly, will not see much difference between the play and the movie. Madea (Perry) is called in to help Miss Shirley (played by veteran actress Loretta Devine) gather her estranged family together to inform them of her impending demise. Despite her best intentions to raise her children to love God and each other, their bitterness and unforgiveness prohibits them from even spending Sunday dinner together without fighting.
The remainder of the cast includes Perry’s usual cadre of actors reprising the roles that made them household names including David Mann as Mr. Brown and his wife Tamela as Madea’s daughter, Cora, and Cassi Davis (star of TV’s “House of Payne”) who plays Aunt Bam, Miss Shirley’s pot-smoking, over-sexed elderly caretaker. As a matter of fact, virtually the entire cast of the stage play makes cameo appearances in this movie.
As usual, Perry uses Madea’s matriarchal position and voice to try to send powerful messages about family, love, relationships, even God, but sadly, those messages get lost in all of the redundant jokes and bad language. Once again, Perry as writer rides the fine line between acceptability by popular culture standards and his core Christian audiences’ standards. There are some who might be drawn in by the title; don’t be fooled, this is not “family” oriented material. Keep the younger kids at home; perhaps mature teens could handle it, but parents should view first.
In various television and print interviews, Perry promises his loyal fans to keep doing the Madea character, as long as his fans want to see her. If that is Perry’s only criterion, Madea’s iconic status will keep her going for many years to come. The question is, should he/she?
Violence: Moderate / Language: Heavy (“h*ll”—70, “d*mn”—28, “d*mned,” middle-finger gesture, “a**”—32, “hoe”—14 meaning whore, “prostitute”—2, “b*stard”—5, “sh*tshow,” etc.) / Sex/Nudity: Heavy (mature thematic material, sexual dialog, and some provocative apparel)
See list of Relevant Issues—questions-and-answers.
1) Please protect your children from somebody who tries to harm them, and bring them justice. Nobody protected the oldest daughter from an uncle who raped her and because the mother didn’t take action or something, the girl became understandably bitter and is now mean to her husband and their son. My only hope is that the daughter will take Madea’s advice and get therapy so she can move on and be able to love her family again.
2) Get a real job if you want to make money, instead of doing drugs. I’m glad that the young man stood up to his ex-girlfriend and current girlfriend by finally deciding not to go back to doing drugs. I just hope he finds a real job to provide for his son despite that he was in jail for a while.
My Ratings: Moral rating: Average / Moviemaking quality: 5