With a setting of Porpoise Spit, Australia
and a soundtrack of ABBA, you can already guess that this film is an oddball
comedy. This is a quirky, often dark,
and brutally real story of a woman, Muriel, past her prime, living with her
parents (an arrogant father and robotic mother), and obsessed with ABBA, yet
it’s hilarious, winsome, and a real gem.
As if things couldn’t get worse, Muriel is also socially inept and
slightly delusional, clinging to a clique of small-town pretty girls that mock
and abuse her. It has a bit of a satirical
take on makeover movies as Muriel undergoes a transformation of her own and finds
a new life. Kudos to the director for
not making her makeover include a weight loss, but just a better haircut. The clever presence of wedding-mania women go
through is hilariously dealt with in the film, and in the end is used as a
serious point for Muriel’s new outlook on life.
It is a refreshingly non-judgmental and all-encompassing look at what it
means to be popular, successful, feminine, and happy for a woman without lots
of luck in today’s world. Despite a
feel-good drive to it, Muriel’s Wedding
is never sentimental or mushy and remains true to its anti-Hollywood take on
melodramatic events (such as finding a gal pal, cancer, and suicide). Muriel
and her life-changing best friend Rhonda are a familiar Thelma and Louise type
pair minus some of the cinematic glam. If you loved Welcome to the Dollhouse or Drop
Dead Gorgeous, you’ll definitely appreciate the dark, meaningful laughs in
this film.