Peeples

As I've mentioned before, a comedy is not the same as another comedy. It has everything to do with writing, directing, comic timing and delivery. Comedy must be the most difficult of genres to convey, because of the fact that you must convince the audience that what you are saying is, in fact, funny. This is truly easier said than done. Once I viewed "Peeples", this 'convincing the audience' concept was definitely a problem this project was struggling with.

After a year of living with his girlfriend, Grace Peeples (Kerry Washington), Wade Walker (Craig Robinson) is eager to propose to her, but she's still reluctant to introduce him to her snobbish family. When Grace leaves for a yearly event gathering at her parents' swanky compound, he hatches a plan to crash the assemblage, charm her folks, and slip a ring on her finger. However, his scheme soon goes awry, and Wade realizes that his only chance of marrying her is a take-no-prisoners confrontation with her father, Virgil (David Alan Grier).

Others to round out the cast are S. Epatha Merkerson as Daphne Peeples, wife of Virgil, Tyler James Williams as Simon Peeples, brother of Grace, Melvin Van Peeples as Grandpa Peeples, Diahann Carroll as Nana Peeples, Kali Hawk as Gloria Peeples, sister of Grace, Kimrie Lewis-Davis as Meg, friend of Gloria, Malcolm Barrett as Chris Walker, brother of Wade, Ana Gasteyer as Mayor Hodge, and Jerome Preston Bates as Skip, ex-boyfriend of Grace.

This was written and directed by relative newcomer, Tina Gordon Chism. This is her first feature film in the directing helm and has only two other films to her writing credit: "Drumline" '02, and "ATL" '06. The directing was a bit stagy, but being her debut, not a bad attempt. As far as the writing goes, I'm not sure if it's because she's still fairly new to writing or that writing just hasn't found her. The premise of this film was basically an African American version of 2000's "Meet the Parents" with Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro. Think about it: boyfriend, Wade visiting his girlfriend's parents, the father is obnoxious, mother understanding, girlfriend oblivious of her family's dysfunction, she has an ex-boyfriend for Wade to deal with, all written in an over-the-top way. Sound familiar? The difference between the two is that "Meet the Parents" was better written. It's not that this was toilet humor, it just wasn't funny humor. Maybe Chism should take a stab at writing a drama next time.

The film had some funny moments, but not enough for this to even get off the ground at all. If you like the lead actors in this, bag it and wait DVD, because even though this tries to be funny, it just leaves you feeling flat.

Out of 4 Stars: 1.5                       Rated: PG-13                           95mins.