The Family That Preys Reviews
Antagony & Ecstasy
Whatever its other sins, the movie cannot be accused of wanting for ambition or scope.
Full Review
| Original Score: 6/10
Cinematical
Exactly the kind of preachy, pandering, tone-shifting, gospel-laced soap opera that [Perry has] served up time and time again to his dedicated audience.
Sin Magazine
I appreciate what Perry is trying to do with his films, and it's nice to see an urban film that isn't a "Gangsta Picture", but he needs to tone down the soap opera qualities and let his stories unfold naturally.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
San Antonio Express-News
(Tyler) Perry, a cinematic one-man band who wrote the script, produces, directs and plays the role of a decent husband and construction worker, is still growing as a filmmaker.
| Original Score: 3/4
Filmcritic.com
To call The Family That Preys a transitional effort would be accurate and fair
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/5
Beliefnet
It has Tyler Perry's trademark trio: sincerity, spirituality, and story. And if he passes on that other "s" -- subtlety -- that's all right.
Full Review
| Original Score: B+
L.A. Weekly
This snail-paced film might as well take place in the 1950s, since it seems to have been inspired by one those Hollywood melodramas in which one company employs the entire town, and the only places free of corruption are the church and the local diner.
jackiekcooper.com
A simple tale of good versus evil that also delivers solid acting and an enjoyable script
Full Review
| Original Score: 7/10
Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)
The closest Perry has come to making something that looks like it belongs on a movie screen and not on a TV set or on the wall of a church basement.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
Quad City Times (Davenport, IA)
Well, GOod for Ty,ler Perry. He has invented his own genre of movie.
Full Review | Original Score: 3/4
EricDSnider.com
Perry may not be dealing with race issues, but he still writes everything in black-and-white.
Full Review
| Original Score: C+
Jam! Movies
When he's not distracted trying to accessorize dresses, Tyler Perry can write a decent enough soap opera.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
St. Paul Pioneer Press
If all Tyler Perry did with The Family That Preys was give Alfre Woodard a good part, that would be enough to make the movie worth seeing. But he does more.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
AV Club
While it's wonderful to see actresses as shamefully underemployed as Woodard and Bates on the big screen, even they can't make sense of [these] incoherent characters.
Full Review
| Original Score: C+
Top CriticThe Family that Preys shows grand advances in the filmmaking education of playwright-turned-filmmaker Tyler Perry. It's also his soapiest film yet, an overwrought melodrama of sibling rivalry, infidelity, family business power plays and terminal illness.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
Boxoffice Magazine
To say that the plot is laboriously constructed is an understatement. The first hour is interminable, filled with dead air that suggests Perry the director was asleep at the switch.
Full Review
| Original Score: 1.5/5
By far the best thing about the enterprise is Woodard. If she's not in this thing, I think it goes kaput.
The film takes off when Woodard's and Bates' characters go on a Thelma & Louise-style road trip.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/5
The movie plays almost exactly like four daily soap episodes stitched together.
Full Review
| Original Score: 1.5/4
As usual, the villains are very bad, and the good guys are very noble -- until they get mad and clock their wives.
Full Review
| Original Score: C+
