Review of The Best Man Holiday (2013) by Maksim B — 19 Apr 2014

The Best Man Holiday is a strange, but heart-warming, mixture of raucous, naughty comedy and a tear-jerking drama. It drives the audience through a variety of emotions only to leave it emotionally exhausted, but satisfied in the end. Despite being way too cheese and melodramatic, it manages to turn a normal, trivial story into a surprisingly emotional and touching delivery.

Fifteen years after the events in The Best Man, the friends and families from the first movie come together for a Christmas Holiday celebrations. Grown up, some successful, others with professional difficulties or estranged from each other, there are enough new developments for the curious audience. With multiple sub-plot lines a first half that is rude, naughty and sharp enough to entertain; one would not really feel offended by the humor and will easily remember the similar style of movie-making used in the first movie.

However, director Malcolm D. Lee takes a most unexpected turn and with one simple line turns The Best Man Holiday from a wild dialogue-based comedy, into a Christmas tear-jerking drama. This comes as a total surprise and the tonality change of the story would probably not be appreciated by many. Yet, even though the final part of the movie is emotionally-exhausting (and definitely not rewarding) and unpleasantly slow paced, it the movie compensates with its honesty and final feel-good mood that brings. To many the second part of director Lee's delivery would be a boring drama, but if you come to terms with this, the movie would actually be a passable one.

The Best Man Holiday is a delivery with two faces, two parts and two sub-stories. This split is not an easy one, but thanks to its talented cast you will eventually laugh and cry until the very end. It will leave you with a feel-good mood, typical for the Christmas season dramas and the passable entertainment will help kill some free time.