The sad and unfortunate fact is that writer/director Rick Famuyiwa truly left his audience hanging for the first time with his latest effort Our Family Wedding. It’s a case of “good idea, bad execution.”
But, based on conversations with Famuyiwa and his ensemble’s attempt to put their best foot forward, their intentions were obviously pure.
“I had done a film with Foxsearchlight before and this was an idea that they brought to me, like ‘would you be interested in doing a film about black and Latino families coming together through marriage?’” Famuyiwa said.
“And I was like, ‘Of course, that’s been done before so we can’t do that,’ but I actually realized that it actually hadn’t been done before.”
So began the creative journey that would bring us Our Family Wedding.
According to Famuyiwa, who has such films to his credit as The Wood, Brown Sugar and Talk To Me, the process ironically began during the crux of Obama’s journey that would ultimately lead him to the White House.
At the time, one big question in politics was: “Will Latinos vote for a black president?”
“It felt like this film was a good way to deal with some of these issues, but not deal with them in the volatile way like it was during the campaign,” he said.
So in the spirit of hope and change, he designed love-struck characters Marcus and Lucia. He’s a black medical school graduate from an upper-class home raised by a single father. She is the product of a stay-at-home mother and blue-collar father who is anxious to see his daughter graduate from law school.
They’ve decided to get married, with both families none the wiser.
“Our marriage, their wedding,” is the recurring meditation that the couple must adopt as personalities and cultures clash.
“It’s about understanding,” said Lance Gross, who plays Marcus.
“Her dad has this idea of his daughter getting married and bringing this Latino guy home to meet him … and then I show up.”
“As I was writing it, it wasn’t, ‘How would they react to a black person or a Latino person?’ but just, whenever someone new comes into your family, you feel them out,” Famuyiwa said.
Throughout the film, slapstick and the lowest common denominator of comedy are often employed, while the more powerful elements of the film fall by the wayside. The film took the easy, cheap way out.
But the cast’s extended time spent dealing with the issues to bring the film to life left them thinking about the message of the movie.
“One of the coolest moments and one of the saddest moments was when we were talking about traditions and Bradd started talking about the jumping of the broom and then he kind of starts making [expletive] up,” said Carlos Mencia, who plays Lucia’s father in the film.
“And to me, that was just a telling moment because of the history of black people in this country. They don’t really have what I have – which is a grandmother that tells me, ‘This is how it used to be, this is how we used to do it and this is how we are going to continue to do it.’”
Fumuyiwa – who is African-American – saw that scene much differently.
“As I was thinking about it, African-American wedding traditions are just American wedding traditions,” Famuyiwa said.
“Because we’ve been in this country from the beginning, there’s nothing that culturally ties us to anything else other than being American.”
The perspectives of the players and their epiphanies from being a part of the film were much more compelling than the film itself.
“I was always so much more aware of how much we were alike that I just feel like racism is so extremely outdated for me,” said America Ferrera, who portrays Lucia.
“Marcus and Lucia are truly are from a generation who truly are colorblind from parents who teach their kids to be colorblind but don’t necessarily embody that. Each generation becomes less and less bounded by those cultural roots and becomes more of the melting pot.”
The light tone to the heavy topic was a major draw for the film’s biggest star, Academy Award winner Forrest Whitaker, to take on the character of Marcus’ father Brad Boyd.
“It’s just unusual to do a message about caring and love and also have this social message about community and culture and being able to look past stereotypes,” Whitaker said.
“That’s a nice message inside a movie that’s so fun and entertaining – that was the big attraction for me to do the film.
Our Family Wedding opens in theatres nationwide tomorrow (Friday, Mar. 12). The film is Rated PG-13 with a running time of 101 minutes.
