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Kingdom Come, 2001, 94 minutes, Rated PG
By Carla Robinson
Directed by Doug McHenry, from a screenplay by David Dean Bottrell and Jessie
Jones (based on their play Dearly Departed), Kingdom Come tries to capture the highs and
lows of dealing with loved ones, particularly during times when they’re not so
lovable. It’s a noble premise, ripe with opportunities to teach us something about
acceptance, loyalty, and kindness, but this heavy-handed schlock can’t decide what it
wants to be. So it oscillates between farce and drama, finding a home in neither.
Funerals bring out the worst in families, and that’s certainly the case with the
Slocumbs. They gather to bury their patriarch, Woodrow "Bud" Slocumb, an ornery
son-of-a-gun. When asked how she wants his epitaph to read, his wife, Raynelle, played by
Whoopi Goldberg (whose dignified performance seems like she wandered onto the wrong set),
says “mean and surly.” And she means it.
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Raynelle and Bud have two sons, Ray Bud (solidly played by
LL Cool J) and Junior (Anthony Anderson). Ray Bud is the eldest and, as such, charged with
making sure things run smoothly. With help from his devoted wife, Lucille (a surprisingly
sweet Vivica A. Fox), the arrangements are made and he can concentrate on other things,
like staying off the bottle.
Junior’s less fortunate. His wife Charisse (Jada Pinkett Smith) is prone to
histrionics and has little concern for anyone else’s problems. What does she care
that Junior’s father is dead? She ridicules Junior over a bad business decision and,
when she discovers he’s been unfaithful, flies into a rage at the wake. But no
matter, because Junior doesn’t seem too concerned about his father’s death
either. He chooses the funeral as the setting to loudly beg Charisse to make up with him.
Yes, I know Black funerals can sometimes be a tad over-the-top, but I’ve never been
to one where people lacked decorum this much.
Next up is Loretta DeVine’s character, Bible-thumping Aunt Marguerite. This is a
special case. DeVine is such an extraordinary actor. But she’s not 25, and she’s
not 110 pounds, and she doesn’t have Halle Berry’s skin tone, which means that
even though she’s gifted and beautiful, she’s relegated to work like this. Aunt
Marguerite would be a complete throwaway, were it not for Devine’s subtle shading.
When she argues with her weed-smoking son, calling him “Demon Seed,” it’s
one of the few genuinely funny moments in the movie.
Toni Braxton fares well enough as a snooty family friend and Cedric the Entertainer
elicits laughs with his portrayal of a lisping, confounded southern minister. The
film’s resolution comes about as a result of his diarrhea, just to let you know what
we’re dealing with here.
In spite of a more than worthy cast, McHenry, who directed the equally overblown
Jason’s Lyric, ultimately has trouble handling the film’s seriocomic tone. And
the screenplay doesn’t help. Rife with elements from the ever-popular gospel plays -
cartoonish characterizations, lots of hollering, melodramatic emotion - the script stinks
of the chitlin’ circuit from which it probably came.
M
May 2001
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