The Big Wedding Reviews

**

Some movies have really good casts and they just don't work out. "Big Wedding" is one of those movies. Robert Di Nero, Diane Keaton, Katherine Heigl, Topher Grace, Amanda Seyfried, Susan Sarandan round out the cast. But even with all that star power, this is a very uneven, unfunny romantic comedy. It's basically about a dysfunctional family coming together for a wedding, and all their problems come to a head. Women will probably enjoy it more than the guys(even though Emily passed out and didn't care for it all). Worth a watch? Maybe a one time on Netflix. But not really worth any money.

It's never too late to start acting like a family.

Good movie! The one line that "The Big Wedding" straddles well is that between comedy and drama. The film is effective when it moves from funny jokes to touching family honesty and back to some more funny jokes. The story lines are very predictable, and sometimes the jokes are too simple and too wrong, but it tries to add in the right amount of drama, and ultimately, it should be entertaining to fans of the genre.

Don and Ellie were once married and have two children, Lyla and Jared. They adopted a boy from Colombia, Alejandro. Eventually they divorce, Ellie moves away and Don hooks up with Bebe, Ellie's best friend. When Alejandro is about to get married, he informs Don And Ellie that he never told his natural mother who is so traditional that they got divorced. And she is coming for the wedding so he asks them if they can pretend to still be married. Don and Ellie reluctantly agree to it and Bebe moves out who is also upset that Don for some reason doesn't want to commit.

I have 2 words to describe The Big Wedding, Chick flick. It seems to me like a mix of other movies with a disastrous result. It has a wonderful cast (DeNiro, Keaton, Heigl, Williams, etc) but not even this reason can save the movie. It has some good moments of humor but in general the comedy is just forced. In conclusion, The Big Wedding its not worthy to watch.

Pretty lame. Good cast is pretty much wasted. Katherine Heigl is quite brittle and you can guess her little secret early on. Amanda Seyfried is underused. Diane Keaton is virtually the same mother character she always plays. I hated Robert DeNiro's character - was a sleazy old creep. Susan Sarandan, not at her most likeable either.
I also didn't like the stone-faced biological mother - very cliched until the very end.
Plot is wafer thin. Can't even be bothered repeating it, and it seemed most of the "adult" cast were, or had been, involved in some shocking sexual thing. The younger cast are pretty tame by comparison. The bit with the "moms" at the end was a step too far for disbelief.
The whole thing had me rolling my eyes, and Robin Williams as some marriage advising vicar thing again - didn't he already play that role in that godawful Mandy Moore movie from a few years back? It's not much better here.
There are a few tame laughs, and it is good to see Topher Grace onscreen, but most of these actors have made far better movies in this genre. 27 dresses, Because I said so, Win a date with Tad Hamilton, Mean girls. Rent one of those instead!

There are so many things wrong with this overblown, idiotic pile of feces that it's actually overwhelming me to put my thoughts in order to review it. Well, first of all, these giant wastes of ensemble comedy have been prevalent lately and they must end. The characters always end up ill defined, baseless, crude, and unfunny. That turns out to be a true statement of the cast assembled for this schlock, and what's so sad about it is that some of the biggest and most beloved names are attached to this film. I can critique every one of their performances negatively: De Niro is a pervert and a misogynist plain and simple, Keaton is playing yet another drippy old mom, Heigl is yet another disenchanted neurotic, and Williams plays another funny priest, because he just did so well in his previous role, right?! The premise is that a divorced couple pretend to be together to please their son's biological mother during his wedding, which in itself is simply too stupid to bear, and even if it was a smart start for a film, it is not utilized as a plot device as well as it could have been. Now, I definitely love mind numbing romantic comedic films, but this film is so far off from what is appropriate for a film to be. The humor is all adult, granting this film an R-rating, but none of said humor is anywhere near funny or smart. De Niro is in a role where he cheats, lies, and makes horrific comments and jokes that are women hating, nausea inducing, and pathetic. Every joke in this film revolves around sex, and really, aren't jokes. It's more shock humor than anything, but there's nothing shocking about a horrible older man who uses women and then makes fun of them for sport. Everyone in this film should truly hate one another, but they keep finding each other's antics to be eccentric or quaint, which is simply scary, not endearing. Only the siblings, who make fun of each other, have any scenes where familiar ties are displayed, but they slip right back into acidic behaviors. That and there's a large block of background information that gets schlepped onto us in the last several scenes of the film, and with prejudice, for no apparent reason other than to add more shock, and what do you know, it doesn't. Seriously, even for a film that at its core only wants to briefly entertain can't even do that right.

The Big Wedding is a creepy and tasteless comedy that never seems to use any of its cast members to their advantage, instead throwing them into a story that would even give a sex predator the chills. The film has an ensemble cast of A-list actors ranging from Robert DeNiro to Robin Williams, and not once does the film use any of them to make a laugh. There were a few chuckles throughout the film, mainly from the comedic talents of Topher Grace, but mainly I found the film to be disturbing and downright crude. It's a story that plays off an awkward situation for far too long and at a certain point I wanted to go home and watch Full House just to see a family with some moral values. This big family is some of the most disturbing, creepy, uncharismatic group of individuals to ever be in a film, I mean they make the Lannisters look like The Partridge Family. That being said, not all the actors failed to bring in some laughs. Topher Grace and Robin Williams gave me some smiles and laughs throughout the film and I enjoyed seeing them, but everyone else in this cast was unfunny, scary, or just plain unlikable. It has a story that makes me want to go to church, a group of characters that need some serious counseling, and few actors that live up to their abilities, and it disappoints me that such a promising ensemble have let their careers lead to crap like this.

The story follows a man (Robert DeNiro) having to pretend to get back together with his ex-wife (Diane Keaton) in order to please his adopted son's real mother who is a strong Christian, while the rest of the family is dealing with their own personal problems.

The plot of the film is so ridiculous and idiotic that it felt like a group of horny college kids wrote it in a day, and I cannot stress this fact enough. I swear this film focuses on one theme and that is sex, which what I means is all the characters ever talk about is sex or failed relationships because of sex. Everything in this films storyline just all comes down to sex, and at a point I thought to myself "so this is where comedy has become, sex jokes." What made the sex jokes in a film like "American Pie" so great is that it took unknown teenaged actors and gave them a movie about teenagers who just want to have sex, but this film has a bunch of adults who just act like they are children who don't know how to solve their own problems. I will admit Topher Grace had a subplot about wanting to have sex with his adopted brother's real sister that had some good laughs, but that is just another example that the writers found a subject like incest to be comedy genius. When I left the theater I was thankful to get out of that cesspool of unrealistic human beings and a bunch of storylines that nobody really cared about. There are many subplots in the film that I could've cared less about, and I wondered if the writers knew the film sucked so they found a bunch of popular actors that they believed would bring in some money. Either way, this story was a disturbing waste of time and makes me disappointed for a good cast of actors to actually participate in this trash.

The cast of the film features some of the best actors in Hollywood, so the mystery of why they would include themselves in this garbage is beyond me. Robert DeNiro plays a womanizing jerk that cheats on both his ex-wife and his new girlfriend, and it just made him almost instantly unlikable. Diane Keaton is pretty much the same old Diane Keaton, just looking much older and in need of a paycheck. Susan Sarandon really didn't bring any laughs to this comedy, in fact nobody would've really noticed if she had been gone to be honest. Kathryn Bigelow is just the dramatic daughter who is mad at her dad and her life, and at this point Bigelow need s to start making some career changes. Topher Grace made me laugh because he is Topher Grace, and I am proud to say that he one of the few actors that actually make this seem like a comedy. Robin Williams screen time is brief but well used, and I have to hand it to him that he still has his magic touch. Ben Barnes is really just used to drive the films story (whatever that is) and with or without him, this film wouldn't have been different. Amanda Seyfried didn't provide any laughs and really had no real purpose in the film, but after "Les Misérables" I guess I expected her to actually do something good with her career, I guess I was wrong. There are a few more actors but I am getting tired of telling you what a failure this cast was, so overall just don't expect anything worth mentioning in this unfunny group of people.

The Big Wedding didn't need to exist; in fact if I could go back I would go watch "Oblivion" a second time just to not have to experience this crap again. Director Justin Zackham has created a worthless and awful experience that will make audience members want to find the nearest exit as soon as possible. There were some positive things about the film, including Grace and William's performances, the fact that it didn't last too long, and that the setting for the film was actually well done. But despite all this, the fact that somebody called this a comedy makes me angry and want to scream at every single person involved in this trash. Zackham doesn't know how to make a comedy and should think about doing something else in his career or quitting altogether, because this does not make me want to experience anything else he has to offer. What made me angry the most I believe was that Robert DeNiro actually joined this films cast after he had finally proven to me last year with "Silver Linings Playbook" that he is still one of the best actors of all-time, so why is an actor of such high prestige including himself in such a waste of time such as this? I will never get my answer most likely, so all I can hope is that other people find this funnier than I did. If you enjoy seeing your money being taken away so you can sit in a chair for 90 minutes and not have a good time, than please be my guest.

I felt like I have seen this type of movie before and done much better than this. It reminded me of movies like Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, Death At A Funeral, Cousins, and License to Wed. It felt like a lot of scenes in the movie were copies of other scenes from other movies. Example, the dinner table scene with Topher Grace reminded me of the dinner scene in the movie the Wedding Crashers with Vincen Vaughn. The film is predictable. It felt like a bad sitcom episode. It could have been much funnier and original. The wedding sequence in my opinion had the most laughs.

I felt like a lot of these actors have played these characters before, especially De Niro and Keaton. Robin Williams is playing the same kind of priest he played in License to Wed. Katherine Heigl seems like she is constantly the same in each role she plays, meaning no range. Ben Barnes, Topher Grace, Amanda Seyfried, and Christine Ebersole are great in their roles.

Overall, this film could have been much better. I would have liked to have seen Frank Oz direct it.

A coming together of amazing potential and material that seemingly time traveled from 1970 to be with audiences today, this Big, fat, but far-from-Greek Wedding ends up to be somewhat of a marriage of inconvenience for moviegoers. As for a better Mediterranean reference than Greece, this flick amounts to more of a Roman Circus as interpreted by a New York playwright. Indeed, Neil Simon would be spinning around in his urn about now...if he weren't still alive to see his CV picked over like a video store discount rack. Here, it often feels like his greatest comedic works have been immortalized in this reworking called The Brighton Beach Memoirs of an Odd Couple Lost in Yonkers with Biloxi Blues on the 23rd Floor or, as writer/director Justin Zackman calls it, The Big Wedding. Though funny at times, the contrived material, with all-too-familiar situations and caricatures shouldered with both pratfalls and supposedly shocking confessions, has a decidedly dated feel. If it weren't for the F-bombs and modern lingo, you'd think that Jack Lemmon and Ann-Margaret were headlining these wedding bell blues.

In this R-rated comedy, a long-divorced couple (Robert De Niro, Diane Keaton) fakes being married as their family (Katherine Heigl, Amanda Seyfried, Topher Grace, Susan Sarandon) unites for a wedding.

Here, De Niro headlines a wonderful ensemble and again astounds viewers with his curmudgeonly comic sensibilities. As a whole, this dysfunctional family generates enough of a spark to make this Deja Viewing almost worth the admission price. If only Zackman's script didn't feel so derivative of past comedies.

Bottom line: The Goodbye Hurl.

One of the worst movies I have seen in awhile. Boring, Unfunny and horribly written. Great actors and a horrible script still makes a horrible film. DeNiro, Keaton and Sarandon surely don't need to slum it this much and Robin Williams does another weird annoying cameo.
08-24-2013

A complete exercise in things we've seen before in other films with "wedding" in the title. The performance of Robert DeNiro alone helps this film rise above being a completely forgettable farce that will be better remembered by the ensemble cast for the memories it provided rather than the audience it was supposed to provide entertainment for. Keaton and Sarandon are fine as well, but it wouldn't hurt their legacy if they started being more picky.

It was a pretty cute film that was good to watch on a day where you had nothing to do.

That being said, its pretty predictable as it comes. It's formulaic and the characters are a bit of a caricatures. However, it does have a great cast and for the most part the characters are somewhat likable. Overall, it has a nice happy tone to it.

Just don't go into the film expecting too much. It's fun, frothy and doesn't take it itself too seriously.

Fun in that there's nothing else to watch but I want to go to the movies and kill some time kind of way.

The great cast managed to entice a few smiles despite a script that just wasn't particularly amusing or interesting in any way and in several places came off as more offensive than funny. The vast majority of it didn't provoke any emotion at all and I doubt I'll even remember I saw it when I'm browsing movies in the near future.

Why do they make movies that have no meaning? Im lucky to see 3-4 great movies a year; this was not one of them.

It's pretty funny. I Love Robin Williams as a priest, since this isn't the only movie where he plays one. I love the way some of these people think too. Priceless. It was predictable, so it loses a little bit of charm that way, but it was still entertaining.

Is it amazingly funny, no, but if you like comedy that can be off-color and come from unexpected places, with some great acting talent to boot, this is worth a watch.

Enjoy!

(1 Star) You couldn't PAY me to care for any of these rich white people problems. There is a total non-conflict in this unnecessary movie and you don't care for anyone. The humor is somehow flat and extraneously crude... it's like watching a PG movie with an occasional F-bomb. There are farcical elements that feel too contrived and forced.

Robert De Niro and Diane Keaton are divorced, but they're RomCom-divorced, meaning they can still be quirky and love each other without being married. Ben Barnes, who is De Niro's adopted son from Columbia, is getting married to Amanda Seyfried. His birth mother is a devout Catholic, meaning she believes divorced people are evil and impure and worse than Hitler (as a Catholic, I could argue that's not how we think, but whatever). So Barnes tells his birth mother that De Niro and Keaton never divorced so she can attend the wedding. WHY?!?! That's not going to stop you from getting married! And you're going to have to keep the lie up for the rest of your life unless you plan on Columbia mom kicking the bucket immediately after the nuptials. It's always great to start your relationship on a huge and idiotic lie. Oh, and Katherine Heigl plays another shrill harpy.

Look, I know I'm not the target demographic for The Big Wedding, but it's repulsive to everybody. It's not funny, it's weird, it's idiotic, it's generic, and everyone's talent is wasted.

If you get this invite in the mail, reject it. Reject it immediately! The Big Wedding is a big cast disappointment filled with off color jokes, juvenile sexual pratfalls, perplexing situations and relationships, ridiculous dialogue, dated material and off-putting or offensive moments. The one thing it has going for itself is its respectable cast but they are so horribly misused and abused I have no idea why a single one of them signed up for this travesty. Robert De Niro (Cape Fear) and Diane Keaton (Father of the Bride) play divorced parents who are reuniting at a beautiful lake house for the wedding of their "brown-skinned" adoptive son, Alejandro (Ben Barnes - Dorian Gray). It is said by several characters that he is Italian because his future mother-in-law (Christine Ebersole - Black Sheep) fears brown-skinned Hispanic babies although he is in fact supposed to be Colombian (but Barnes is actually a British actor who apparently hit the tanning beds a few times before filming the role ... not offensive at all, no?). Susan Sarandon (The Client) is the father's new girlfriend although she was at one time also their mother's best friend. The entire situation could be very awkward but the trio makes the best of it ... even as one of them walks in on the other two going at it on the kitchen counter. Yes, really. So many of the moments in The Big Wedding had me question whether or not I was actually seeing what my eyes were (sadly) ACTUALLY seeing because the content and situations were so dreadfully bad (not to mention embarrassing to some of the actors). Topher Grace (Take Me Home Tonight) and Katherine Heigl (The Ugly Truth) plays Alejandro's two adoptive siblings -- him a sexually-challenged doctor who is relentlessly pursued by Alejandro's "real" sister (uh -- gross but played by Ana Ayora - Marley & Me) who comes to the wedding and her a cold who-knows-what. Her purpose it to act sour and frustrated throughout the entire movie (perhaps she was the only one who read the script and couldn't help but act this way after being contractually obligated to it). The Big Wedding is another "wedding shocker" (think 'Game of Thrones') but for a different reason ... this one is unbelievably bad. There isn't even a word for how bad this is. Four Oscar WINNERS in this cast (the fourth is Robin Williams playing a manic and bumbling priest) and we get this tripe? Could this possibly have been a paycheck film?

Loved it. I thought it had a cute and very funny story to it and all of the actors/actresses held their own. Good film and would definitely buy on blu ray when available.

it wasn't very good The acting was sub par. What on earth were Robert De Niro, Diane Keaton, and Susan Sarandon doing in the piece of garbage? It was slow drawn out and in parts just boring. I did not like it.