There's a theory suggesting that people who don't like scatological humor harbor a fear of death, and it makes sense: Death is the ultimate example of our bodies turning against us, and in life, anything that reminds us how messily human we are -- and how little control we have over our bodies -- brings us one step closer to the ultimate flush. So in the movies, shouldn't poo jokes and death go together like chocolate and peanut butter?
In Death at a Funeral Neil LaBute runs with that idea, or at least sprints with it. The specifically scatological crudeness really lasts only for one scene, and it involves a Tracy Morgan sight gag that at first seems to go on too long, although ultimately, it's the character's prolonged horror that makes the sequence funny (or not, depending on your tolerance for chaotic vulgarity). In general, LaBute doesn't have a natural gift for the kind of freewheeling, slightly crass comedy this needs to be. To his credit, he tries to prevent the humor from becoming too broad; even the movie's more slapstick moments are handled with a dash of elegance. But his decorum too often comes off as reticence, and it tugs at the story's forward motion. The movie's rhythms are stop-and-start and touch-and-go, and they ought to be smoother.
But it's the spirit of LaBute's picture that makes it enjoyable, and also what sets it apart from Frank Oz's somewhat snoozy 2007 original. (It does follow the basic plot of the original quite closely; both versions were written by Dean Craig.) And if the movie sometimes flirts a little too dangerously with cheap homophobic laughs, by the end LaBute and his cast pull it back into the safety zone -- the ultimate vibe is one of inclusiveness. Chris Rock plays Aaron, an aspiring (and, it's strongly suggested, lousy) novelist who's been entrusted with arranging his father's funeral, which is to be held in the family's stately, gorgeously appointed home. (It's never made clear what dad's line of work was, but he comes from a family of well-educated, well-heeled professionals.) Aaron's troubles begin early on when the casket, containing what's supposed to be his father's body, arrives at the house. He looks inside and assures the bereavement professional that there must be some mistake: "You can't just mess up my order!" After some back-and-forth folderol, it's revealed that the casket does, in fact, contain some random Asian guy.
Once that mess is cleared up, others pile on: Aaron is dismayed when his younger brother, Ryan (Martin Lawrence), who's made a killing writing potboilers, shows up at the family home: He's always been the clear favorite of mom (Loretta Devine), who's also fixated on the fact that Aaron and his wife (Regina Hall) have not yet given her grandchildren. The family gripes and misgivings extend beyond the immediate household to various friends and relations. Zoe Saldana's Elaine, the niece of the departed, is bringing her fiancé, Oscar (James Marsden), to the funeral, even though her doctor-dad strongly disapproves of him. Columbus Short is a pharmacology student who puts the wrong drug in a familiar bottle, Danny Glover is a cranky, foul-mouthed uncle in a wheelchair (his caretaker is the more-than-hapless Tracy Morgan), and Peter Dinklage is a scowling sexpot in a leather jacket who shows up to drop an explosive revelation about dear departed daddy's personal life. And somewhere in the midst of all the mishegoss, Keith David, as a not-so-reverent reverend, yells at a sweet church lady to sit down.
LaBute might not seem like a logical choice for this farcical material. But one of the more intriguing aspects of his career is that he's rarely the expected choice for anything: If the same guy who made the deeply misanthropic In the Company of Men can also turn out a lush, entertaining romance like Possession (disliked by many A.S. Byatt enthusiasts, though I think LaBute actually improves on the story), then why shouldn't he try his hand at a dark family comedy with poo jokes? His actors seem to respond to his approach: Rock, as usual, is easy-going and affable, but his lines also have a deadpan sharpness that gives dimension to his nice-guy likability. (He also brings the movie a touch of gravity and class at its most crucial moment.) And Marsden, in the eternally hilarious role of the ridiculous white guy (come on -- you know they're funny!), has a number of terrific physical bits. After mistakenly ingesting a powerful hallucinogenic -- this is a farce, remember -- he suddenly finds himself in love with everything and everyone around him, including a trio of cherubic garden statues. At one point he slithers and hops along a garden path like an exotic frog-salamander hybrid, relishing the sights, sounds and smells of nature as only a doped-up freak can.
And last but hardly least, there's also the matter of this remake's casting. The original was, for whatever it's worth, a movie with a surfeit of white people. And while white people can be perfectly lovely, we already have plenty of them in the movies. In the past few years we've seen an increase in the number of movies being made specifically for black audiences, often by African American directors -- Tyler Perry is the most ubiquitous example. But in 2010, the idea that movies featuring mostly black performers are only for a "specialized" audience is a bizarre and retrograde one. Since when do African Americans constitute a specialized audience, in a country where white people are nearly -- if not already -- a minority? Death at a Funeral is an imperfect comedy, but as a movie with a mostly black cast, made by a white director, that isn't being marketed strictly according to color lines, it's a step forward. At the very least, it's a casual antidote to movies in which black people are barely a presence, except as background dressing in restaurant scenes. Death, sadly, is the thing that brings us all together as human beings. But really, why wait?