Good Deeds

Good Deeds (2012) is a movie that I recently watched on HBOMAX. The storyline follows a rich business owner who has an unappreciative fiancée and reckless, angry brother. His life seems perfect but when he meets a down on her luck single mother janitor in his building, he decides to help her out and falls in love in the process. His perfect life is about to take a drastic turn...

This movie stars, is written and directed by Tyler Perry (Diary of a Mad Black Woman) and also stars Gabrielle Union (Bad Boys 2), Thandiwe Newton (Crash), Eddie Cibrian (The Cave), Phylicia Rashad (The Cosby Show), Rebecca Romijn (X-Men), Jamie Kennedy (Scream 2) and Brian White (Stomp the Yard).

This picture does a great job of depicting a single mother's struggles and Newton delivers a tremendous performance. The characters are unique and the situations are perfectly depicted. The soundtrack is absolutely tremendous. I will say many elements felt unrealistic but still made you smile as they unfolded. The mother and daughter dynamic is well portrayed and the child acting by Jordenn Thompson was impressive. The conclusion was cliche but made me smile.

Overall, the ratings for this are a bit harsh. I would score this a 7/10 and recommend seeing it once.

I have now seen some Tyler Perry movies that weren't good (like Madea's Big Happy Family) and some that were (his adaptation of For Colored Girls... was the best so far). This one was better than expected since he doesn't play that stereotypical mammy-type character that I just mentioned nor does he put any obvious comedy scenes that makes one groan like in that first movie I just wrote about. In fact, the only character I thought was truly one-dimensional was that of his no-good-brother played by Brian White who has no business being part of their father's company but because he's family...Anyway, Perry plays perhaps the most caring of businessmen one would expect to be depicted in modern cinema as he discovers a female janitor played by Thandie Newton who's on welfare because of some personal troubles. Oh, and Perry's engaged to Gabrielle Union and has a mother played by Phylicia Rashad who's a little uptight though she also knows where she's been. In summation, Good Deeds was a nice surprise for me concerning Mr. Perry's output and on that note, I recommend it.

If anyone goes to the theater thinking that this film is a romantic comedy they are in for a big surprise because it is a full on drama. The first half hour of this film was almost too depressing to bare, primarily because Lindsey (Thandie Newton) found herself in one bad situation after another. This leads me to my first observation about Tyler Perry movies, which is that his characters are typically so one dimensional. He plays the male lead Wesley Deeds (Tyler Perry) and he is just entirely too predictable and too good to be true, well that is until the elevator scene. His antithesis is his brother Walter Deeds (Brian White) who is too enraged to be true. Then there is their mother Wilhimina (Phylicia Rashad) who is a true piece of work with her disdain for her younger son and complete and utter worship of her eldest. The extreme misfortune time after time that befalls Lindsey, all just became too much. People are just not that one dimensional, the only character that was somewhat rounded was Natalie (Gabrielle Union) who conveyed a whole range of emotions, which is what people do. They are happy, they are sad, they are frustrated, they are thoughtful and they sometimes get inebriated just hanging out with friends. But no one is the same all the time. I understand the approach in film making, it makes it clear what type of person the character is, so you know who to cheer or boo, but it leaves very little to the intellect of a viewer. People are not simply one emotion they are very complex, even in the span of an hour and a half. A very bright light in contrast to most of the adults was Ariel (Jordenn Thompson), what an adorable child. Which leads to my second observation of Tyler Perry movies, he does an amazing job of including exceptionally talented people in his films. I would have liked the story much better if it had focused less on the Lindsey dilemmas and more on the budding romance between Lindsey and Wesley. And I was completely thrown off with the final setting of the story because it failed credibility. I'll just say that down and out people do not typically have a passport to readily leave the country on a moment's notice, and some countries require that you receive a bevy of immunizations before visiting. With that said, I give Good Deeds an amber light.

This film is true to Tyler Perry's style in that he always wants to convey positive messages. There were so many messages in this film that I don't even know where to start. The film demonstrates that no matter how much money you have, you can still be unhappy in your own skin. It also made me realize that I should stop gripping about the things that I don't have and consider myself blessed to have what I do because there is always someone out there that has it worse. I am glad to see Tyler Perry (Wesley Deeds) step out of the comedic genre. I think that he was very believable as the romantic lead. I really hope that he continues to expand the types of films that he makes so that he does not become stereotyped as a one-hit-pony. Gabriele Union (Natalie) is always perfection in any role that she plays. I don't think that she gets the credit that she deserves, but I will say that she did a fantastic job hosting the BET honors awards (she is very funny). Thandie Newton (Lindsey Wakefield) pulled at your heart strings in this film. Every time I see a homeless person on the streets I always ask myself, "I wonder how he/she got here". Well, Lindsey answered that question for me in this film and makes me realize that sometimes it is to no fault of the individual. It's just life and things happen. Thandie is like a chameleon transforming from a strong-willed woman in For Colored Girls, to a beaten down struggling women in this film. Brian White (Walter Deeds) reminded me that there are still haters in this world and definitely convinced me that he was the king of the haters. Tyler obviously like working with Phylicia Rashad (Wilimena) because he has cast her in a couple of films with good reason. I don't care how many films I have seen her in; every now and then I get a glimpse of Mrs. Huxtable. Is it just me? The one thing that I have to say about the audience in this theater is that we all reacted the same way at the same time and we did it out loud. I love that! I also have to say that I love this film although it was very predictable. It was just refreshing to see a positive film for a change that conveyed basic life messages. I give this film a green light.

I look at it like this ... for a Tyler Perry movie this was a comeback. Okay some scenes were a little 'awkward' and slow, but I was impressed with this film. You can see he is trying to reset the tone of his movie making and get back to the basics of telling the story. He decided to take the lead part in this film and I think that it was a bold and precise move on Tyler's part. He had to let his audience know that he is here to stay. He is bringing his core essence of film-making that drew people to him in the first place. He is a fantastic black man who tries to cut out 'the crap' of films and just wants to display real life. He has fumbled around casting and made some 'just for giggles' films but he knows how to remind us all of just how simple we all are and how we are all connected in this game of life.

If one thing we should learn from him is his insatiable need to put us all in the shoes of another person. Let's be a little more compassionate for a man who isn't afraid to pick himself up, dust himself off and keep trying ... just my little thought ;-)