DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN
By
Victoria Alexander
FilmsInReview.com

But first: While I do in fact check The Drudge Report many times a day for those important Michael Jackson updates, as well as all the gossip sites, my devotion now goes to Perez Hilton’s www.PageSixSixSix.com. This is the website to follow for all the anti-PR celebrity news. Plus, while Drudge might let us know about the T-Mobile Terrorist’s exploits, PageSixSixSix.com has all the photos and text messages right at hand. Here is Perez’s biographical sketch: “I'm the trashtastic Cuban cousin of Paris and Nicky. I currently reside in a penthouse apartment high above the Hollywood Hills with my pet poodle Mariel. My signature colors are blush and bashful. My favorite drink is a Viagra Martini. My motto is "I'm gay, but I'm not as big a slut as Paris". I love animals, enemas and animus.”

Perez, I pledge slavish loyalty to you and pay homage to your website.

DIARY’S sweet Helen (the expressive Kimberly Elise) is the devoted wife of ruthless, smug attorney Charles McCarter (Steve Harris). She has no idea he is a vicious, venal criminal and womanizer! They have been married for 18 years and live in a palace in Atlanta, Georgia. Helen signed a pre-nup but has good jewelry. Charles has two toddlers with his Latino mistress Brenda (Lisa Marcos). Where in the world has clueless Helen been? Charles shouts at her that they haven’t had sex in a year. Now there is a hint worth noting and considering.

A complaint has been raised that I often rate the audience and not the movie. Well, these are the people cueing up (it was announced that the line for DIARY formed at 4P.M. for the 7:30 show), pay for tickets, and tell their friends how they liked the movie. The audience’s response means something to me (and bad behavior must be addressed). And here, the audience screamed, talked back, and liked Helen but loved her grandmother Madea (Tyler Perry). DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN is critic-proof. Madea is the anti-Oprah we all want on our side when things go terribly wrong.

Who the hell is writer/composer/producer/actor Tyler Perry? He has produced, directed, and starred in seven theater productions. DIARY has been adapted from Perry’s highly successful play. Here, Perry plays three roles and bursts on the movie landscape with charm and a sly slap at Christianity – while keeping a very strong spiritual base underlining his movie. Even though Perry left the directing duties to Darren Grant, it is Perry’s movie.

While Helen is a clueless saint and Charles is a mean bastard, the gun-swinging “big-boned” Madea is a hot-spring of fast-talking jive and a sense of frontier justice the audience fell in love with. As soon as Madea hears that Charles dragged Helen out of her palace, she takes a chainsaw to Charles’s mansion. She is appalled Helen allowed herself to be thrown out of their palace. In that improbable way things work in movies, Charles hired a friend of Madea’s, Orlando (Shemar Moore), to help move out Helen’s stuff. Eighteen years of marriage and she has a small U-Haul of stuff to pack?

Orlando has already been beatified by the Church due to his good looks and saintly goodness. Orlando is not to be lusted after. He is to be worshipped as an unsullied male longing for the love of a good woman. He wants to be Helen’s knight in shining armor. He’s patient. He wants a family.

But there is that little problem of revenge and, damn it, forgiveness. The women in the audience, myself included, appeared not to be so interested in forgiveness. We wanted Charles to suffer. Some women in the audience were more vocal than I, but we all felt Charles was getting off too easy.

Perry believes in forgiveness and Christian values but through his characters, Madea, Joe, and Brian, he gives his audience enough trashy real-life dialogue to allow us go along with the underlining theme of redemption and happiness through forgiveness.

It is a nice message skillfully designed. No matter how much success Perry has accomplished with his stage work, he’s now a Hollywood player.

Tyler, my email address is below.

Victoria Alexander answers your emails. She can be reached by visiting FilmsInReview.com or, directly, at masauu@aol.com.

DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN
Lions Gate Films
A Tyler Perry Co. production in association with BET Films

Credits:
Director: Darren Grant
Writer: Tyler Perry
Producers: Reuben Cannon, Tyler Perry
Executive producers: Michael Paseornek, John Dellaverson, Robert L. Johnson
Director of photography: David Claessen
Production designer: Ina Mayhew
Music: Elvin Ross, Tyler Perry
Co-producer: Mike Upton
Costume designer: Keith Lewis
Editor: Terilyn A. Shropshire

Cast:
Helen: Kimberly Elise
Charles: Steve Harris
Madea/Joe/Brian: Tyler Perry
Myrtle: Cicely Tyson
Orlando: Shemar Moore
Debrah: Tamara Taylor
Brenda: Lisa Marcos

MPAA rating PG-13
Running time -- 117 mins