I don’t mean to be a nitpicker but when a modern gospel movie needs to enlist Dolly Parton and Jeremy Jordan to annie up the box office you might expect inconsistencies in tone and intonation. (“ba dum dum ching”). In the annals of musicals out to sweep the widest commercial swath, Joyful Noise is particularly revolting. Regurgitating sitcom cliches (“Hey man, you’re on your third marriage and you have the same set of inlaws each time”), we’re marooned in a la-la land of mixed race relationships, (Jordan and the winning Keke Palmer), Sly Stone/Paul McCartney/Michael Jackson covers, and a catfight between Parton and Latifah that is so poorly staged it has all the personality of an open-mike-night sketch gone awry.
Characters in Noise serviceably mimic stereotypes that you would expect. One particular Latifah choir cohort beds down an Asian choir member who dies in her bed of a heart attack. Tifah then suddenly possesses a stigma about it that goes through three or four joke recycles before we’re done with it. Through that Jordan (“Toniiiighhhht Tonighhhht”) goes after Palmer, but her mom (Latifah) doesn’t let her date. Patton and Latinas are at odds over the direction of the Pacashau, a Georgia Sacred Divinity Church choir. Latifah favors straight buttoned-down gospel. Parton and her son (Jordan) want to rock out (with their ridiculously large old boobs out.) Guess whose side wins in the climactic competition performance? Come on…. Just try….
The stretches between the songs have all the character of shipping box filler popcorn. You like Dolly Parton? Me too. Seek out “9 to 5” or “Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.” You’re a fan of Keke Palmer? She’s regularly on TV’s “True Jackson.”
Then there’s the music. If you’re interested in gospel music, may I recommend 2011’s excellent documentary “Rejoice and Shout”? Where it pulsed with verve and soul at every turn, unlike Joyful Noise that putters into a jelly-like puddle.
3 Hallelujahs (out of 10)
Comments are closed.