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Last Updated: Mar 6th, 2008 - 20:47:16 |
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| Ain't nobody dope as me... |
Take four comedians with onscreen chemistry, add a spoof of the vacuous soul of celebrity and sprinkle in a dysfunctional family reunion and you have the amusing elements of “Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins,” one of the better recent efforts from the funny wing of Black Hollywood. (It is certainly better than “First Sunday.”)
Poor Roscoe (Martin Lawrence), who is a talk show host cross between Dr. Phil, Jerry Springer and Oprah, is depicted as a decent but ambitious man who revels in the celebrity life he shares with his fiancé, Bianca Kittles (Joy Bryant). As a winner of the television show, “Survival,” Bianca has transferred all the driven, maniacal aspects of her personality needed for that win to
her day-to-day life. In a very L.A. sort of way, not seen on screen since perhaps Robin Givens played several roles as a Black man eater, Bianca keeps her world on a tight leash of accomplishment. She knows exactly what she wants, how she is going to get it and what is clearly unacceptable in her realm of the high life.
Sure, Bianca’s depiction is extreme—women are sort of thrown under the bus in this one—but the men don’t come off looking much better. Martin Lawrence, Mike Epps and Cedric the Entertainer compete with Mo’Nique to be the sorriest and funniest of them all when they all gather in the South for a wedding anniversary celebration for Roscoe’s parents.
Down home, the successful Roscoe finds himself at the center of the, by now, stock story of the rich Black relative who comes home and has to deal with his relatives who are either ghetto (Mo’Nique), country-ass (Cedric the Entertainer), broke-ass and/or walking around with a loose screw (Mike Epps). The ways that the dysfunctional rich fit perfectly into this odd stew help to make this film funny in surprising ways.
Another thing that works is the individual funny that each comedian brings to their role. The film is written and directed by Malcolm D. Lee, who directed but did not write the hilarious 2002 film “Undercover Brother.” Lee definitely has some jokes in this one—especially involving canine love—but it seems likely that the film’s comedic quartet offered some choice jokes to the script and fed off of each other, upping the comedic ante as they went along.
The final element that “Roscoe” has going for it is the fact that, unlike some movies, its storyline is not laughable. It actually makes sense and, despite the comedy, the script makes all the characters very human—flawed, but human. There is even some romance thrown into the mix that allows Nicole Ari Parker to once again play the role of the pretty, redbone sweetheart.
“Roscoe” is a rough-and-tumble comedy. It reminds us that families can be wack, and that going home can also involve getting beat down in more ways than one.
Esther Iverem is editor of www.SeeingBlack.com and author of We Gotta Have It: Twenty Years of Seeing Black at the Movies, 1986-2006. She will be a part of a program this Sunday, Feb. 10 at 2 p.m. honoring the work of filmmaker St. Clair Bourne at the American Museum of the Moving Image in New York City.
You can order Esther Iverem's critically praised We Gotta Have It: Twenty Years of Seeing Black at the Movies, 1986-2006 (Thunder’s Mouth Press, April 2007)at Amazon.com or purchase at your favorite bookstore. It makes a wonderful gift! Thanks!
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