Shotgun Wedding Review

Slow and protracted the death of the American comedy vehicle may be, it has thankfully accelerated over the last few years. Cheech Marin shall go down with his ship by the looks of it. Shotgun Wedding has, rather obviously, taken said weapon and rammed it straight into the usually wonderful celebrations. To expect anything tremendous, provocative or engaging from the man that directed the first Pitch Perfect movie is to set the bar far too high. As solid a feature that was, it appears Jason Moore has failed to move his vision on over a decade after first setting out into this now conflated, dreary genre. Comedy is dead and it is not the attention span of Instagram reels that killed it, but the lack of quality that a once staple making had.

Shotgun Wedding may throw itself toward some action-oriented moments, but at its core is a dreary and inevitable working. Lenny Kravitz makes for a disappointing appearance as a jilted ex-lover that hires pirates to hound his former fiancé and her new flame. Desperately, desperately stupid stuff. It is the concept that sounds better on paper than it does in reality. Jennifer Lopez and Josh Duhamel portray an absolute dullard couple with doubts about their future together, but their marriage vows come after an achingly poor series of action set pieces that hold no real value or momentum. Their plot armour is thick and obvious, the lack of skill that comes from Shotgun Wedding is the various side characters and the horrific qualities they show.

Wedding parties made up of kooky characters and comedy legends make for a thoroughly dull time. Marin and Jennifer Coolidge share a handful of uninspired moments, and it is their defiance and consistency that shows the real issue of Shotgun Wedding is the script. Mark Hammer has written generic pieces before, and he will write generic pieces after. Two Night Stand has come and gone and what remains is Shotgun Wedding, a premise that feels interesting but is played out like a dopey scenario-driven action flick. The action is not interesting, the dialogue is not engaging. Those fundamentals detract from the adventure around this resort, and the lack of chemistry that comes from Lopez and Duhamel is more problematic for the lack of character elevation than it is for the various pratfalls their characters, Darcy and Tom, are put through.

Instead, the audience is put through a madcap journey through absolutely nothing of interest. Shotgun Wedding may base its title on that hurried wedding legend, but it has nothing else relating to that concept. Sluggish, tiring and just plain unfunny. Singing setpieces, slow-motion montage shots and Kravitz wearing a white blazer with no shirt underneath. All the showcases of a Caribbean wedding right there, and not a second of it enjoyable under that brutal, empty style. A feature that closes its credits with footage of the cast members having more fun making the film than the people watching it could ever hope to have. One of those features. A comedy where the in-jokes and genuine material is hushed away and off-screen, while the audience is left to watch big-budget explosions on a small screen.