By Valorie Vernon
Entertainment Editor

“Death at a Funeral” provides plenty of laughs but takes a while to get to the point.
Director Neil Labute took a 2007 British film by the same title, moved it to America and changed the ethnicity of the characters. The result was alright but not great.

One strength the film had was its cast of stars. The cast which included Chris Rock, Martin Lawrence, Zoe Saldana, James Marsden, Tracy Morgan and Peter Dinklage provided funny moments and awkward situations which were slightly too awkward at times.

After the death of his father Aaron, Rock is forced to handle the arrangements of the funeral. Balancing the chaos of the funeral, the arrival of his famous brother, Lawrence, and the constant pressure of both his mother and wife to have a child Aaron is overwhelmed by the pressure. When a man comes forward to reveal a dark secret about his father everything goes crazy.

While the film was funny it seemed as though it took quite a while to get to the point. With no expectations of genius the film still lets audiences down.

There were some hilarious moments provided by Marsden.

When his character Oscar is given hallucinogenic drugs and then faced with his girlfriend’s father who hates him the result is catastrophic.

Much of the humor in the film was provided through cheap gimmicks.

It seemed as though the only way the filmmakers could think to make the movie funny was to make it loud and filled with profanity.

The film is definitely entertaining and provides plenty of laughs but it is definitely not going to be recognized by Roger Ebert anytime soon.

Maybe if the characters were given a little more thought and a few less drugs the result would be different but as is the film is simply mediocre.