Rachel Getting Married
Posted by Tycho on March 24, 2009
And boring the crap out of me
Rachel Getting Married falls into the specific genre of quirky dysfunctional family dramedy. If you’re not a fan of these types of films, and maybe even if you are, there’s really no reason to watch. The family itself isn’t quirky themselves, but the people they choose to surround themselves with are. Rachel’s (the one getting married) fiance is a musician and most of his friends are musicians. The film, though not a musical, is filled with a variety of musical acts interspersed with various toasts for the happy couple.
Unfortunately, these seem to make up the bulk of the movie, leaving the dysfunctional family dynamic floundering behind. This would be more of a problem if the main story were actually interesting, which it’s not. Nor is it handled in a really compelling fashion.
The main drama of the movie revolve’s around Kym, who is just getting out of rehab as the film starts. During the course of the film we find out what caused Kym to enter rehab, then the wedding happens and Kym ends up going back to rehab. There’s no resolution to any of the conflicts, and none of the characters are even that likable.
The only moments that I really felt worked was seeing Kym in her AA meetings. Most of the time she sits listening, or quietly battling her own internal demons, and in the most compelling scene of the film talks about her past and how she is dealing with it at the moment.
Outside of the meetings, Kym just comes across as needy and self-absorbed. Rachel, who was often in the background as a child because of Kym comes across the same way. We spend the bulk of the movie with these characters and I had a hard time sympathizing for either one.
The film is shot in a hand-held documentary style, which is another big problem that I had with it. While it added to the really quiet scenes, any time there was any sort of movement, either from the characters or the camera, the whole thing became an erratic mess. I ended up getting frustrated from the camera work more than anything.
It’s not very often that I decide to stop a movie before making it through even a half an hour, but I wanted to with Rachel Getting Married.
