Here are the ingredients: one DVD of Sister Act I & II, one episode of American Idol on VHS, one hip hop freestyle demo tape of T-Bone, a CD of stand-up comedy from both Mike Epps and Steve Harvey and a poster of Beyonce Knowles, washed, peeled, and ready.
If you ever had the crazy idea of making this cinematic gumbo, I recommend cooking at 700 degrees, because the batch of film that I saw was clearly half-baked. A semi-believable plot line is thrown at a very talented Cuba Gooding, Jr., and the man who "showed us the money" as an NFL receiver juggles, bobbles, and falls flat.
The premise is that Darrin Hill (Gooding Jr.) must whip a dilapidated gospel choir into shape for an upcoming contest called the "Gospel Explosion". If successful, Darrin inherits $150,000. The "Temptations" lose ground quickly, however, when Hill turns out to have huge character flaws. Most movies can avoid making their stars out to be awkward in the eyes of the audience, by employing people called "screenwriters". This script, however, dictated that its lead-role act completely out of touch with reality. More than anything, Darrin Hill was a pathological liar, making it extremely painful to watch Darrin crash and burn with a number of whoppers.
With one of his bigger lies, Darrin impersonates a music producer and tries to create a choir. When the auditions for singers end up making Gooding play the glorified talent scout a la Simon from American Idol, the movie becomes a joke. My first hint is when inmates are allowed to leave their cells to sing in the church choir. After one of the inmates (T-Bone) breaks out into a three-minute rap about Jesus and drugs, I decide to sit back and just wait out the rest of the movie. After all, I've never seen a rapping choir. The blatant end to character development forces me to work with a clich?? that goes something like "superficial urbanite from North meets wholesome, rural Southerners." Even this scenario is destroyed by an even larger clich??, when each character reveals they are in it for the money and not Jesus. No way!
Perhaps saved by a different type of comedy, The Fighting Temptations definitely kept a smile on my face for most of the movie. But the smile only broke into a laugh for a couple minutes the entire movie. I was looking forward to a good ten minutes of laughter from comedic geniuses Epps and Harvey, but it turns out that I would have been better off watching The Steve Harvey Show. At least that's on the WB and you can blame the sensors. M.T.V. and Paramount clearly dropped the ball on this one. The comedy barely gets going before it is silenced by bad storyline.
Which leads me to the main question: Why? Well, the way I see it, Beyonc?? Knowles has a great agent, and any merits that the screenplay offered were quickly eclipsed by the film's star potential. I heard two of her songs on the way to the movie theatre, and one on the way back. She's clearly trying to make the jump into superstardom. She even has a good deal of real acting time in the movie. Knowles is almost always alongside Cuba Gooding Jr., which certainly doesn't hurt, but you can tell she is trying to establish some kind of rapport as an actress.
Perhaps it was satire that was trying so hard to squeeze its way out of the screen. There's some semblance of this intent apparent when Darrin Hill quits his job of advertising and exploitation. Is he being sent up as some ridiculous archetype? Well no, because satire requires the finesse that director Lynn showed in The Whole Nine Yards. This time, the serious undertone to Darrin Hill's speech when he quits his job prevents any opportunity for the audience to read between any lines.
Playing more like a soundtrack than a film, The Fighting Temptations just didn't do it for me. Out of a possible 100, I give it a 32. I could think of many other ways to waste two hours, but this was as good as any other. If you see the movie, just keep an open mind, and enjoy a brief break from reality.
