The Wedding Party

The weakest De Palma's film, as Murder a la Mod, Greetings & Hi Mum are still interesting underground movies worth seeing, not this one, clearly poor.

Wedding Party, The (1969)

1/2 (out of 4)

Incredibly bad comedy was the second feature for director Brian DePalma. A groom (Charles Pfulger) shows up at his wedding party only to discover there's more to marriage than he thought. This film doesn't work on any level and the worse part is that I only laughed once throughout the 90 minute running time. Not even the young and chubby Robert DeNiro (spelled DeNero in the credits) can help this thing. The film uses faster frames per minute than normal, which I'm guessing is an attempt at silent slapstick but this doesn't work either.

This film is very slow paced and dated. I got this as I am a huge fan of Brian De Palma and must, simply must see everything he does and did. This film however is not very good. I would like to pawn it off on the fact that De Palma did not direct the whole thing and was just one third of the team but that would be a lazy cop out. This movie is slow because he and the others are new and inexperienced at film making. This was one of his first movies if not the first and you can tell he is a virgin as far as film-making goes. This movie does a few high points. Their is the typical fast forward motion that most De Palma films have in this but I think it was more to save film in this than to be artistic, but it was out of this that the fast forward shots for Carrie, Hi, Mom, and Greetings were born. Their is also a highly funny portion in this movie with an Arab ex boyfriend of the bride who comes to visit. I love this part of the movie the groom is trying to pass the bride off to the Arab so he can free himself from the shackles that will be marriage, but the Arab does not bite and gets the heck out. This movie is also good because it has early performances by Robert De Niro and William Finnley. They are great as the grooms guest and I love that they are in this. Watch this movie for De Palma's growth as a filmmaker but stay away if you are just an average movie goer.

Mr. De Niro's first film, credited Denero. It's his first because it was filmed in 1963 and only released in 1969. Unknown actors in the cast, except for a very young Jill Clayburgh (19 years old) who, although she doesn't have too much screen time, she is the most compelling. De Niro does not make much difference in his role, he is only present in the landscape, it could have been anyone in his place. First Feature Film directed by De Palma too. Zero stars!

I enjoyed The Wedding Party for about half an hour to 45 minutes, but then it just kept going and I eventually felt a bit tired from it all. It revolves around the dynamics between people all involved with a wedding, but it's just not tight or clever enough to work as a great comedy for all of its run. It doesn't really seem all that interested in setting up memorable comedic scenarios and paying them off, and I think once I realised it wasn't really going anywhere, I kind of turned on the film.

Still, the manic energy and scrappy charm of it all sustains The Wedding Party for at least some of its runtime, but at the same time, it's a film I'd find hard to recommend to most people.