Feel-good film is formulaic but OK for teens .
Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns (2008)
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Reviews Counted:52
Fresh:15
Rotten:37
Average Rating:4.8/10
Consensus: Angela Bassett's considerable charms can't compensate for Meet the Browns' incessant melodrama and scattered narrative threads.
Rated: PG-13 [See Full Rating] for drug content, language including sexual references, thematic elements and brief violence.
Runtime: 1 hr 41 mins
Genre: Dramas
Theatrical Release:Mar 21, 2008 Wide
Box Office: $41,939,392
Synopsis: Adapted from the stage play, TYLER PERRY'S MEET THE BROWNS is a touching family drama and very funny romantic comedy rolled into one. Angela Bassett gives one of the best performances of her career... Adapted from the stage play, TYLER PERRY'S MEET THE BROWNS is a touching family drama and very funny romantic comedy rolled into one. Angela Bassett gives one of the best performances of her career as Brenda, a single mother trying to raise three children, from three different men, in the Chicago projects. After the plant where she works with her best friend, Cheryl (Sofia Vergara), closes down, she can no longer afford her rent, electricity, or day care. But when a surprise letter arrives telling her that the father she never knew has died, and inviting her to the reading of the will and the funeral in Georgia, she has nowhere else to go, so she and her kids, Michael (Lance Gross), Tosha (Chloe Bailey), and Lena (Mariana Tolbert), head down south to meet her half-sisters and -brothers. Her newfound extended family includes the overemotional Vera (Jenifer Lewis), who is suspicious of Brenda; the wacky Leroy Brown (David Mann), who mangles the English language and wears some hysterical outfits; and the steady L.B. (Frankie Faison), who is married to the sweet and caring Sarah (Margaret Avery) and has become the patriarch now that Pops Brown has died. In the meantime, Michael, a high school basketball star, is being pursued by Harry (Rick Fox), a talent scout who is also interested in Brenda. Bassett is outstanding as the dedicated mother who sacrifices her personal life in order to do whatever she can for her children. But Mann nearly steals the show as the wild and crazy Leroy, especially during the funeral scene (outtakes of which run during the closing credits). Perry, the creator of such hit films as DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN and MADEA'S FAMILY REUNION as well as the television series HOUSE OF PAYNE (all of which feature recurring characters), also appears in the film as Uncle Joe and, in a riotous subplot, Madea, who is on the run from the law. [More]
Starring: Angela Bassett, Rick Fox, Margaret Avery, Frankie Faison
Starring: Angela Bassett, Rick Fox, Margaret Avery, Frankie Faison, Jenifer Lewis, Lance Gross, Sofia Vergara, Tamela Mann, David Mann, Tyler Perry, Irma P. Hall, Mariana Tolbert, Chloe Bailey
Director: Tyler Perry
Director: Tyler Perry
Screenwriter: Tyler Perry
Producer: Reuben Cannon
Composer: Aaron Zigman
Studio: Lions Gate Films
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Reviews for Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns
a disappointing follow-up considering Perry seemed to be on the verge of challenging himself as a filmmaker instead of settling into his old, more familiar niche.
Meet the Browns is packed with raucous dinner-table banter and broad double takes; sometimes the gags are funny, but usually they're just trying too hard.
Meet the Browns is lots of fun -- light on the Jesus-ifying and heavy on showcasing some very talented African-American performers whom audiences don’t get to see often enough. You’ll be glad to have been introduced.
To appreciate Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns, there's really only one requirement: Loosen up.
Atlanta-based playwright-turned-entertainment mogul Tyler Perry's fourth feature may be his most awkwardly plotted, cliché-ridden effort to date.
There are a few laughs and some touching moments, but nothing you couldn't get by watching episodes of Good Times and Little House on the Prairie back to back.
Whatever progress the man was making, Browns is a Madea-sized big fat step backward.
Meet the Browns is saddled with the usual quotient of phony snafus and entanglements that are easily untangled.
Eventually something's got to give, and the slapdash feel of Meet the Browns hints that [Perry] might need to give himself a break.
While Bassett's performance deserves a better forum than Perry can provide, she gives his latest movie a sense of dignity its predecessors lacked.
An adaptation of one of his stage plays, Meet the Browns gives off the distinct feeling that Perry is treading water or at the very least is content to satisfy his audience with the minimum.
Feel-good themes of resilience, faith and family aren't sufficient to redeem this scattershot single-parent dramedy from the Diary of a Mad Black Woman auteur.
Meet the Browns is a typically affectionate, revealing and somewhat sprawling family comedy.
Meet the Browns, the latest Tyler Perry film, has a good heart. But it's a mess of a movie.
This isn't a movie: it's a buffet at which... Perry piles your plate with spoonfuls of absurd melodrama, a taste of gritty urban drama, a heaping of cheap cartoon, and a big side of corn.
Overall, 'Tyler Perry's Meet The Browns' is not as multi-layered and spiritual uplifting as a the previous films, but it will still appeal to his usual fan base.
It's Tyler Perry's aesthetic in a nutshell: strong, suffering female protagonists, no-good men, clear-cut ethical quandaries, schizophrenic tonal shifts handled as gracefully as bumper-car collisions, and a complete absence of moral ambiguity.
It'd be nice if [Perry] took more time to think about lighting and staging a scene -- but hey, he really doesn't have to.
The film demonstrates all too vividly its creator's penchant for soap opera-style melodramatics, absurdly broad comedy and offensively stereotypical characterizations.
Latest News for Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns
July 27, 2008:
Master of disguise Perry's tangled web of narrative threads range from poignant to positively awful. ![]()
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June 30, 2008:
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June 27, 2008:
Master of disguise Perry's tangled web of narrative threads range from poignant to positively awful. ![]()
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June 26, 2008:
Adaptation of Tyler Perry stage play to the screen features Rick Fox and Angela Bassett. ![]()
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| Tomatometer Percentage | Movie |
|---|---|
| 77% 77% | The Hangover |
| 88% 88% | Inglourious Basterds |
| 66% 66% | Public Enemies |
| 24% 24% | G-Force |
| 44% 44% | Night at the Museum: B… |
| Tomatometer Percentage | Movie |
|---|---|
| 82% 82% | Paranormal Activity |
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