Family and friends come to a lovely house in the English countryside to mourn. Things start badly when the wrong body is delivered. The son of the deceased (Matthew MacFayden) worries that his eulogy will pale in comparison to the one his brother, a big-shot writer, could deliver. The niece worries about whether her crusty father will like her new fiancé. A family friend worries more about the rash on his arm. But this Frank Oz-directed farce ends up revolving around a small stranger (Peter Dinklage) and a pill bottle. There are one or two overfamiliar elements, like the cantankerous grandfather, but some orginality about the way they're handled. The plot requires undue carelessness surrounding the handling of both the pill bottle’s mislabeled contents and the mystery man. However, the characters are essentially believable, and one or two are colorful. There’s the odd bit of (literal) toilet humor but no fart jokes. Getting funnier as it goes along, this is a Funeral that most people should enjoy.
IMDB link
reviewed 8/30/07
Saw this in a theatre at a special preview. My only positive impression was, "There's a Jane Asher in the film? Is that THE Jane Asher, the one who dated Paul McCartney?" Yes, it is. And she looks good for her age. So Beatles enthusiasts will appreciate that. That was about it. I can't believe someone as esteemed as Rupert Graves, who has acted so beautifully in Maurice, a film which stood for gay freedom of expression, agreed to be part of this ghastly film that tried to make it seem funny to torture and murder a gay character. It was unfunny, predictable, and one of those movies where the trailer was skillfully cobbled together to make it seem much more clever than the film ultimately is. I walked out of the theatre really feeling like I had been suckered.
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