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Category:    Home > Reviews > Comedy > Drama > African American Culture > Faith > Relgion > Stage Play > Madea’s Big Happy Family (2011/Blu-ray)/Laugh To Keep From Crying (DVD)/Meet The Browns – Season One (2011/DVD/Tyler Perry/Lionsgate)

Madea’s Big Happy Family (2011/Blu-ray)/Laugh To Keep From Crying (DVD)/Meet The Browns – Season One (2011/DVD/Tyler Perry/Lionsgate)

 

Picture: B-/C+/C+     Sound: B-/C+/C+     Extras: C+/C-/D     Main Programs: C+

 

 

If the recent spat between Spike Lee and Tyler Perry is any indication, Perry’s success and work is getting under the skin of more than a few people.  It is said you cannot argue with success, but sometimes that success comes from repetition and Lee is not the only one to comment though his comments are usually negative without better ideas.  With Perry, you get (usually) comedy works with or without Medea.  Here are three types of his comedies now available.

 

Madea’s Big Happy Family (2011) is his latest feature film playing Madea and it is about the title character doing things that are bad from anyone else but excused because Madea is a sort of “agent of God” by default and with plenty more faults than most.  Can she bring together two families out of control?  Depends how crazy she gets, but the crazier the better.  I love the Brady Bunch poster and cover ad campaign (guess that makes Madea the anti-Alice, the maid played by Ann B. Davis on the show) and the result is another competent and consistent, if sometimes predictable romp.  Extras include Digital Copy for PC and PC portable devices, and four featurettes: Ties That Bind, “Byreeen”: The Baby Mama From Hell, Madea’s Family Tree and Brown Calls Maury.

 

Laugh To Keep From Crying (DVD) is the latest of Perry’s stage plays that happen to be the starting ground for just about all of his works and they also tend to be musicals extensively.  You can read more about them at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6267/Tyler+Perry+%E2%80%93+The+Plays

 

In this one, another mix of crisis and potential relationships as the characters (in gospel music style) go through another long melodrama (this is 140 minutes), but their faith can save them.  I have to say it is not easy to do this as a musical and they are musicals more so than say, old Elvis Presley films, but the songs are not memorable in the long run though work in the context of the narrative when they happen.  Cast & Audience interviews are the only extra.

 

Finally we have Meet The Browns – Season One (2011) which is actually a spin-off from one of those stage musicals that also became a feature film release, which you can read more about at the Play review above and at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/7260/Tyler+Perry%E2%80%99s+Meet+The

 

Perry’s second hit series after House Of Payne, it is more of the same, a sitcom that has more of the same humor and is even shot to look and feel like the previous show.  If you love the older show, you’ll at least like this one.  If not, you will not be as impressed.   There are no extras over the three DVDs that hold all 20 episodes.

 

 

The 1080p 1.78 X 1 digital High Definition image on Family was shot in HD and can look good, but has its share of motion blur, soft shots and even an overcast look.  This is basically what I was expecting since he switched to HD and from the previous Perry’s feature film Blu-rays such as this set I covered a while ago:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10566/Tyler+Perry+Blu-ray+Wave+(Diary+O

 

 

The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on the DVD releases are even softer with the same blur from HD shooting.  Still, they are at least clean and color is consistent, though the range is not what I would have liked.

 

The DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 7.1 lossless mix on Family is towards the front speakers, but this is a mix that i9s really pushing it for a dialogue/joke based release, though it does benefit the music and sound effects.  The DVDs have Dolby Digital 5.1 mixes at best, but they are not as much multi-channel presentations as they are expanding the sound recorded and the recording is not bad.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo


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