BEFORE: Caught the Sunday/Monday overnight flight back from San Diego - I almost didn't make it, or perhaps I almost didn't get my excess merchandise shipped back. For a while there, it looked like I'd have to make a choice - ship the boxes back and miss my flight, or ditch the boxes. Well, I learn a little more about how to run a Comic-Con booth each year, and this year I learned that the Fedex office in the convention center is a complete rip-off, adding on multiple surcharges, just because they can. It's a long story, but I took a cab up to a suburb called Mission Hills and shipped them back ground at a 24-hour FedEx (UPS is cheaper, but closed on Sundays). However, I spent extra money on the cab up there, so it probably was a break-even sort of deal. Anyway, I'm still completely exhausted, slept most of Monday afternoon away, and I need to ease back into the movie routine with a nice, light comedy. Hope this is one.
THE PLOT: A reverend puts an engaged couple through a grueling marriage preparation course to see if they are meant to be married in his church.
AFTER: I have some experience with this subject, I took the Catholic Pre-Cana class when I got married the first time, so that my marriage to a non-Catholic (a Presbyterian, horrors!) would be sanctioned. There were a lot of hoops to jump through, and a lot of promises were made - I had to promise to raise any children as Catholic, even though I haven't felt particularly Catholic-y in about 25 years. So I was put in a terrible position. I had to promise not to raise my children as heathens, which is a sin, I suppose - but lying is also a sin, and I had to lie in order to get the marriage approved by the diocese. I even asked the priest which sin was worse - lying or having heathen children - and apparently it's the latter, since he fell just short of telling me to lie. A lie, after all, is between me and God, but having kids who aren't coming to church would hit the diocese right in the wallet, one or two future Catholics who aren't contributing to the collection plate.
It's that kind of hypocrisy that really drove the wedge between the Church and me - oh, I went to the Presbyterian services once in a while, but the damage was done. And then so was the marriage, but for a completely different reason.
It bothers me that movies don't really make a distinction between a legal marriage and a church service. Doesn't everyone know that you can get married at City Hall, and that the ceremony is just for show? You sign the paper, and you're essentially married, and free to have whatever type of service (or no service) you want. The 2nd time around, I was married by what I thought was a Justice of the Peace, but she really turned out to be an Interfaith Minister. I suppose that's acceptable for a couple of agnostics/athiests. Hedge your bets, I say. But she worked with us to have as much or as little mention of God in the service as we wanted, which was really considerate. She did work for us, after all, something a lot of young brides and grooms don't seem to acknowledge - it's YOUR day, make of it what you will.
On the flipside, there are movies like "The Philadelphia Story", where a groom heads for the hills, and another warm body, like an ex-boyfriend, steps into the service. Umm, but his name isn't on the marriage license! Am I the only one who can see that?
The point I'm trying to make here, is that there is a distinction between the state's opinion of a marriage, and the Church's. Kind of a timely point when you look at the news out of New York these days. Legally, gay couples are JUST as married as the ones who have a church-sanctioned wedding, as much as the Church doesn't want to admit it. When you put a minister in charge of signing off on your marriage, you're putting it in the hands of someone who couldn't possibly know as much about marriage as you do. (I know, there are ministers and reverends who are allowed to marry, and good for them. But work with me here.)
In this film, we've got a minister (Robin Williams) who puts a young couple through a series of unorthodox (pun intended) exercises designed to test their relationship - after all, unless you test it, how do you know it will last? But it's tough to figure out his angle - does he intend to break them up, or just toughen them up? These methods repeatedly injure the young groom, or make him look foolish, so that sort of put his goal in question for me. What does he gain by putting them through the wringer?
Again, this is a man who knows a lot about the theory of marriage, but very little about the actual practice. Asking them intimate questions about their sex life, or putting a bug in their hotel room seem to cross the line from advisory to just plain creepy. And giving them two impossibly realistic robot babies to care for - is that really the best method, when the same effect could be achieved by just simple babysitting (which for some reason, happens simultaneously) or visiting a day-care center? Jeez, I see babies on the subway and it makes me realize how much work their care requires - it's not rocket science, or even robotics.
But, of course, this is where the film resorts to slapstick, comedy of the lowest kind. Stinky robot diapers (is that even possible), hitting a baby to make it stop crying (unacceptable, even with a robot baby), and for good measure, a baseball to the face (really? Not even a nut shot?).
Do a little digging, and you'll determine the real reason that Catholic priests can't get married - it has absolutely nothing to do with celibacy being close to holiness, or being singularly devoted to God and not a wife. After all, the first priests were Jesus's disciples, and he told them to "be fruitful and multiply", not to remain celibate. So why the disconnect? In the Middle Ages, priests were known to father a child or two (or, more likely several hundred...) so the Pope came up with the celibacy concept to cut down on the number of bastard priest children, who could have property claims against the Church, and demand to inherit Church land. Anyway, we know that even today there are priests who go against their vows of celibacy - so how'd that end up working out for you guys?
(This is a true fact, and I bring it up not as a dig against the movie, but as a point of order regarding the Church. But where else am I going to spread the knowledge and enlighten people?)
Anyway, it's a nice light comedy - and I'm probably getting too hung up on the details, since I've got an axe to grind. But an extra point off for the way-too precocious kid who works as a minister-in-training.
Also starring John Krasinski (last seen in "It's Complicated"), Mandy Moore, Peter Strauss (last heard in "The Secret of NIMH"), Eric Christian Olsen (last seen in "The Comebacks"), Christine Taylor (last seen in "Zoolander"), Grace Zabriskie (last seen in "Armageddon"? Geez, a lot of tough ones tonight...), with cameos from Rachael Harris (last seen in "The Soloist"), Bob Balaban (last seen in "Midnight Cowboy"), Wanda Sykes (last seen in "Down to Earth"), and three of Krasinski's co-workers from "The Office": Mindy Kaling, Angela Kinsey, and Brian Baumgartner (last seen in "Four Christmases").
RATING: 3 out of 10 fancy cheeses
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