BWW Review Roundup: Taye Diggs Stars in THE BEST MAN HOLIDAY

After nearly 15 years apart, Morris Chestnut (Identity Thief), Taye Diggs (Baggage Claim), Regina Hall (Scary Movie franchise), Terrence Howard (Hustle & Flow), Sanaa Lathan (Contagion), Nia Long (Soul Food), Harold Perrineau (Zero Dark Thirty), Monica Calhoun (Love & Basketball) and Melissa De Sousa (Miss Congeniality) reprise their career-launching roles in The Best Man Holiday, the long-awaited next chapter to the film that ushered in a new era of comedy. When the college friends finally reunite over the Christmas holidays, they will discover just how easy it is for long-forgotten rivalries and romances to be ignited.

Malcolm D. Lee returns to write and direct this sequel to his directorial debut. Sean Daniel (The Mummy franchise) produces alongside Lee for The Sean Daniel Company. (c) Universal Pictures

Let's see what the critics have to say...

Nicolas Rapold, The New York Times: "Mr. Lee's film is more traditional than its sexually frank humor might indicate, with faith and charity ultimately given pride of place (right alongside human pettiness). But even if some of the crudeness and the drama feel forced, it's hard to hate."

Claudia Puig, USA Today: "Some funny lines (including a risqué interpretation of the term "stimulus package") and comical repartee are interspersed among the maudlin moments. But too many major life events and career climaxes are packed into these few days. Despite some likable performances from this appealing ensemble cast - and Diggs stands above the pack - sentimental schmaltz competes with slapstick silliness for an uneven result."

Ann Hornaday, The Washington Post, "In other words, you don't go to The Best Man Holiday to deconstruct its flaws. You go for its myriad, adamantly un-cerebral pleasures. You go to see Chestnut take that shirt off. You go to giggle at Howard, then come up short during a frank and unexpectedly moving encounter when he talks about money with one of his friends."

Michael Phillips, The Chicago Tribune: "Some of the writing is pungently funny, as when Jordan's new squeeze (Eddie Cibrian) is described by one of the characters as "a tall vanilla swagga latte. The first film's clash of true Christian believers and nonbelievers was part of the fabric of the comedy, though it wasn't all played for laughs. This time there's a blunt tone to the inspirational uplift."

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: "Back in 1999 The Best Man was an outrageously fresh comedy of love and backbiting, and not just because it marked Hollywood's belated discovery that characters could be upscale and African-American at the same time. The movie had wit, verve, spark, and surprise. But writer-director Malcolm D. Lee shouldn't have waited 14 years to do a sequel. The Best Man Holiday reunites the characters for a Christmas-weekend house party, and what ensues is like a better-written Tyler Perry movie: too many life crises rooted in too much recycled backstory. "

Alonso Duralde, The Wrap: "Lee also never seems to notice that the women in both movies are held to a much higher standard over their past behavior than the men are. This isn't presented as a failing of the male characters; it's just something that the male writer-director does without apparently realizing it. The ending (which involves, among other things, a layman delivering a baby that's in the breech position - don't try this at home) couldn't be more contrived, but again, it's a Christmas movie, and we all have our favorite flavors of seasonal schmaltz. The kind that The Best Man Holiday serves up was, for me at least, too hard to swallow."

Stephen Farber, The Hollywood Reporter: "Some of the crises that these characters face are more interesting than others. Harper's financial problems resonate in today's economic climate. On the other hand, the uproar surrounding a video that ex-stripper Candace (Regina Hall) made many years earlier is milked much too strenuously. The film as a whole veers rather uneasily from broad comedy to teary dramatic crises The irreverent humor works best. A catfight between Hall and De Sousa is delicious fun, and Howard steals the movie with his uproarious sexual shenanigans."

Andrew Barker, Variety: "To see these characters indulging in the same catty asides and childish histrionics while pushing 40 begins to strain audience sympathy, particularly when there are a number of genuinely affecting grace notes and plot threads buried within all the noise. Most notably, the central relationship between Harper and Lance is sensitively sketched, delineating the complicated ways that adult male friendships can seesaw between resentment and vulnerability, and Harper's increasing desperation to keep up appearances in the face of financial hardship strikes a painfully realistic chord."

For more info on The Best Man Holiday click here!

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