Rachel Getting Married (2008)

Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt) is getting married; so druggie little sis Kym (Anne Hathaway) is getting out of rehab for the weekend. Self destructive Kym, who's been in an on again-off again drug induced stupor for the past decade is returning to her parent's home to help celebrate the nuptials. Kym arrives just in time to rehash long standing family conflicts with a self-righteous/control freak sister, the undermining best friend, a self-absorbed mother, and a father who--well, let's just say it's going to be very busy weekend.

Rachel Getting Married is a human drama of self destruction and assaulting political correctness with Johnathan Demme at the helm. Recalling the buzz around Hathaway's 'amazing' performance and Demme's 'little film that could', I can't believe THIS is the film everyone {air quotes} was talking about.

Demme attempts to create an art film here with multiple story arcs of loss, pain, hate, love, and redemption. All we get is an affluent family that chooses to whine instead of cope with life. Waaaa! I'm sad.

From the various ethnically correct social network to the painfully forced dialogue, Demme tries to smash events together and create a cohesive weekend of wedding events. Nothing works here. The forced confrontations between Kym and practically everyone onscreen are devoid of any emotional depth or character that would make this viewer--any viewer--care. I think Demme realizes this as he forces Kym to crash {mildly} a car. When that doesn't work, he has Kym smack her mother.

Rachel Getting Married served only to irritate me. For 90 minutes I put up with mediocre acting, political correctness and pseudo melancholy expecting a payoff of some merit. WRONG!!

Kudos to Demme for one thing: Creating a steaming pile of sh!t and successfully passing it off as pate.