Film Review: Same Weary Tyler Perry Format in ‘Peeples’

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CHICAGO – The Tyler Perry “filmmaking machine” cranks out lowbrow comedies or high drama potboilers without any regard for originality. While this may jibe with Perry’s creative vision, the films themselves are a waste of time. Tina Gordon Chism directs the latest Perry production, “Peeples.”

Rating: 2.0/5.0

“Peeples” has nothing new to say about familial relationships – even though it’s about family – and plenty to say about redundant gags, inexplicable character motivations and overblown reactions to the simplest of tasks. One idea of what is suppose to generate laughs is to put grown adults on bicycles that are straight out of a urban hipster’s garage, and have them race each other. Although the cast is pure gold – Craig Robinson, Kerry Washington, David Alan Grier, S. Epatha Merkerson, Melvin Van Peebles and Diahann Carroll – they have to try their damnedest to spin that gold from a script made of lead. The return of these films might win on a show “business” platform, but the law of karma and diminishing creative returns demands that Tyler Perry will one day have to atone for these extended misuses of celluloid.

Wade Walker (Craig Robinson) is an affable musician who caters to children with songs that make them learn something – which allows for a song about going to the bathroom – and is about to pop the question to his longtime lover Grace Peeples (Kerry Washington). However, his fair lady is distracted by an upcoming family reunion, at an estate in an wealthy New England fishing village. Walker has never “met the parents” or her extended family, who he has dubbed, the “Chocolate Kennedys.”

After Grace convinces Wade he doesn’t need to come to the weekend proceedings (a celebration of the novel “Moby Dick”), he is convinced by his brother Chris (Malcolm Barrett) to crash the weekend, which he strangely does. Instead of being uncomfortably told to leave, he is uncomfortably greeted by family patriarch Virgil (David Alan Grier), mother Daphne (S. Epatha Merkerson), and later, Grandpa and Nana (Melvin Van Peebles and Diahann Carrroll). As the family secrets are unraveled, this is about to become one nutty weekend.

Continue reading for Patrick McDonald’s full review of “Peeples”

Grace (Kerry Washington), Wade (Craig Robinson, center) and Virgil (David Alan Grier) in ‘Peeples’ Photo credit: Lionsgate

Continue reading for Patrick McDonald’s full review of “Peeples”