Death at a Funeral
There's nothing in "Death at a Funeral" that's any funnier than the tagline that appeared in some of the advertising: "A family that puts the F U in funeral." That's gold! The movie, a madcap British farce from director Frank Oz ("Dirty Rotten Scoundrels," "In & Out," the voice of Miss Piggy), offers a few solid laughs and is generally fun, but it's nothing great. I kept thinking it was taking its time to set up characters and scenarios that would later pay off in a frenzy of hilarity, only to realize the frenzy wasn't coming. It's more a mild torrent of hilarity. Scattered hilarity with a chance of guffaws. The action occurs all in one afternoon at a picturesque English country home where a funeral is to be held for the family patriarch, Edward. His oldest son, Daniel (Matthew MacFadyen), is in charge of the arrangements, while the other son, Robert (Rupert Graves), a successful novelist now living in New York, is waltzing in at the last minute to make an appearance. Daniel, a natural-born worrier, wants to be a novelist, too, and is highly conscious of the fact that everyone's expecting his brother the wordsmith to give the eulogy, not him.
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