Review:
I have a friend who was incensed when Wash was killed at the end of Serenity (sorry if I just ruined it for anyone, but that movie is kind of old now). He can enjoy more of Alan Tudyk’s acting in the (relatively) recently released film Death at a Funeral. Sadly Tudyk isn’t a lead member of the ensemble, but he steals every scene he is in and helps tie the story together.
These ensemble pictures are sometimes hard to summarize plotwise, and I am afraid that’s the case here. The briefest, spoiler-free runthrough I can give you is that Daniel’s (Matthew MacFadden) father has passed away. There is going to be a funeral. At that funeral will be psychedelic drugs, grumpy old uncles, a blackmailer and a casket that gets opened way too many times. Ewan Bremmer is here (that would be Spud from Trainspotting, as if you didn’t already know) in a small part as well as Rupert Graves as well as the afore mentioned Tudyk, laying on a sly British accent.
Both I and the friend I saw the film with laughed out loud multiple times over the course of the movie. That’s saying a lot from a black comedy that I expected to be wittertainment. The script by Dean Craig and the direction of the masterful Frank Oz really bring this film to life. Oz has definitely soaked up a great deal of Britishness over the years. The proof is right up there on the screen.
I highly recommend Death at a Funeral. It features all the sorts of things you wish movies had more of…crisp dialog, great acting and a special friend in the form of a dwarf. You will laugh and perhaps be moved by the end. How’s that for an (extremely) late summer picture?