Rediscovering romance among all the cliches
Laden with clunky dialogue and romantic comedy cliches, “Mother of the Bride” is the kind of movie where people talk to each other right on the edges of ponds or swimming pools. Conversations are mere preludes to pratfalls.
But the film, which premiered Thursday, May 9, on Netflix, features an ebullient performance by Brooke Shields as Lana, a Bay Area geneticist whose influencer daughter, Emma (Miranda Cosgrove, “iCarly”), is getting married in Thailand. Plus, the whole cast is likable and the scenery lovely, making this only the second-worst Shields beach movie, after “The Blue Lagoon.”
Lana has not yet met Emma’s fiancé (Sean Teale) when she arrives in Phuket for the wedding. The daughter lived in London when she became engaged and agreed to be married just a month later at a resort owned by a brand she promotes on Instagram.
The quickie-nuptials premise is needed to explain how Lana was unaware her future son-inlaw’s father is Will (San Francisco native Benjamin Bratt), Lana’s old flame from Stanford and now a wealthy venture capitalist. Will ghosted Lana way back when, and seeing him again brings back painful memories. But soon the pair are dancing together, with Lana looking newly besotted.
Any similarity between this story of gorgeous exes in their late 50s and the Bali-set 2022 George Clooney-Julia Roberts movie “Ticket to Paradise” is probably intentional. Director Mark Waters (“Mean Girls”) and screenwriter Robin Bernheim (Netflix’s “The Princess Switch” movies) leave no influence nor trope unexplored.
Instead of choosing one rom-com sidekick type, “Mother of the Bride” gives Lana a sassy, on-themake gal pal (Rachael Harris) and Will a fun-loving, truth-telling gay brother (Wilson Cruz, “My So-Called Life”) and brother-in-law (Michael McDonald, “Mad TV”). Turns out everyone was pals during college, leading to the movie’s most enjoyable sequence, when the group re-creates a college day trip to Santa Cruz at a remote Phuket beach.
Less fun is Chad Michael Murray as a vacationing doctor pursuing Lana romantically even though she finds him too young. Murray is in his 40s and thus actually in Shields’ romantic wheelhouse — especially according to vacation rules. But his character is too lurky, treading water near the swim-up bar or loitering by the pickleball court, waiting for Lana to appear so he can flirt.
Shields and Bratt are good sports in performing the movie’s goofy physical comedy, and they show an immediate familiarity with each other that sells their characters’ previous bond. But they are often energetically incompatible. Projecting anxiety and touches of hope, Shields makes Lana’s enduring emotional investment in Will palpable. Bratt does not match her commitment, although Will expresses unresolved feelings of his own.
Whereas Lana has no chill, Will is too chill. Bratt’s naturalism has always been key to his considerable screen appeal. But he barely shifts inflection here, whether Will is discussing hotel towel service or romantic regrets. Granted, Bratt is working with featherweight material, but even beach wedding movies — much like beach weddings themselves — require a lot of effort.
Shields brings the most passion to Lana’s relationship with Emma, who is so obsessed with pleasing the resort company footing the wedding bill that she neglects her mother. Shields and Cosgrove create believable motherdaughter affection and tension, despite being saddled with dialogue like Lana’s line that she had “promised herself she wouldn’t cry” at her daughter’s wedding. Why in the world not?