For the first hour or so, this is a really, really well done selling your soul for fame and fortune kinda movie--not literally of course, but the film deftly depicts Dexter Jackson who's dreamed of being a news reporter for so long that he's more than willing to increasingly change his personality, and his mannerisms---ironically the same brash personality that on impulse led him to pick up the camera and microphone from a dead reporter and finish the live telecast that the reporter was shot doing his own self. Is it wildly implausible that that's a thing that could actually happen??? Oh yes, but it is not at all implausible that someone with Dexter's swagger or personality could be an automatic hit connecting with viewers on the airwaves. The conniving and power hungry news producer fully realizes how connected with the audience this random guy is, and immediately sees his potential, the only thing is she's convinced that in order to be successful at a national level, than the guy is going to have be more polished and less "guy off the street" so she gives him elocution lessons (sorta like My Fair Newscaster) and straightens his hair, basically she tries to make him more white....which his subconscious must immediately realize because its not too long before Dexter starts seeing his image on the tv screen becoming a lot paler and a lot lighter each time he turns himself on.
The way this is done is something that's akin to a horror film---it feels like something Jordan Peele would do quite honestly. Trying to interject a sense of everyday horror/social conscience in the midst of this broad seemingly carefree comedy about "movin' on up" in a white man's world.
All of that is handled really well until the movie introduces the plotline that the movie ends up locking into until the end which is the power hungry producer sees ratings potential in having her rising star marrying the weather woman live on the air. She's white, but even if she wasn't, it would've still been a bad idea for the movie to suddenly become about forcing the main character into an unwanted relationship because the movie goes from being about the increasingly disstressed guy's mental state to being more about this broad situation he finds himself in that's like right out of a bad sitcom. I get that the sham marriage/wedding ceremony serves as a catalyst for his conscience to finally reassert itself after being subservient to his news producer's will and changing himself over to the point that he literally doesn't recognize himself on the tv screen anymore....BUT I also didn't care at all whether or not he goes thru with this sham wedding because the whole thing was a bad idea to begin with. And unfortunately the disruption of this sham wedding makes up the climax of the movie, and I don't know, while I liked how the movie dealt with him rebelling against his "white image" and regaining the certitude that made him catch the producer's eye in the first place, the stuff with the bride, and the bride's parents, who's also the minister, and his actual girlfriend beating up the evil news producer, yeah I didn't care for any of that--it felt like a real misstep. Not a fatal misstep, but everything up til then was rather deftly handled, and then all of a sudden it becomes this completely different kinda comedy, more broad and physical. Ah well. I still enjoyed the movie enough tho. Love the soundtrack! (And its use of the song "Hold On I'm Coming" was quite excellent)
The way this is done is something that's akin to a horror film---it feels like something Jordan Peele would do quite honestly. Trying to interject a sense of everyday horror/social conscience in the midst of this broad seemingly carefree comedy about "movin' on up" in a white man's world.
All of that is handled really well until the movie introduces the plotline that the movie ends up locking into until the end which is the power hungry producer sees ratings potential in having her rising star marrying the weather woman live on the air. She's white, but even if she wasn't, it would've still been a bad idea for the movie to suddenly become about forcing the main character into an unwanted relationship because the movie goes from being about the increasingly disstressed guy's mental state to being more about this broad situation he finds himself in that's like right out of a bad sitcom. I get that the sham marriage/wedding ceremony serves as a catalyst for his conscience to finally reassert itself after being subservient to his news producer's will and changing himself over to the point that he literally doesn't recognize himself on the tv screen anymore....BUT I also didn't care at all whether or not he goes thru with this sham wedding because the whole thing was a bad idea to begin with. And unfortunately the disruption of this sham wedding makes up the climax of the movie, and I don't know, while I liked how the movie dealt with him rebelling against his "white image" and regaining the certitude that made him catch the producer's eye in the first place, the stuff with the bride, and the bride's parents, who's also the minister, and his actual girlfriend beating up the evil news producer, yeah I didn't care for any of that--it felt like a real misstep. Not a fatal misstep, but everything up til then was rather deftly handled, and then all of a sudden it becomes this completely different kinda comedy, more broad and physical. Ah well. I still enjoyed the movie enough tho. Love the soundtrack! (And its use of the song "Hold On I'm Coming" was quite excellent)