Meet the Blacks (2016)

Having watched some pretty heavy films in the past couple of days, I needed something light and dumb to switch off the brain a little and I watched Meet the Blacks. Though there's not Marlon Wayans in it as I was expecting (don't ask me why I thought that because I don't even know it), it wasn't neither as awful as I was expecting. Maybe because, knowing nothing about it, I was expecting a Meet the Fockers kind of plot. And yes, I was wrong again because Meet the Blacks is kinda like a parody of The Purge. 

After getting his hands a lot of unexpected money, Carl Black (Mike Epps) leaves his hustling lifestyle behind and moves from Chicago to Beverly Hills with his family, new wife Lorena (Zulay Henao), daughter Allie (Bresha Webb), son Carl Jr. (Alex Henderson) and cousin Cronut (Lil Duval), in hope for a better life. He picked a terrible time to move, that day of the year known as the annual purge, where all crime is legal for twelve hours. 

Whether you have seen The Purge or not, you'll find the plot to this film very predictable. Unlike DeMonaco's film, this one is pretty damn stupid too, and ridiculous and nothing makes the least sense. 

And the characters, what a mess! Actually, for them to be a mess some writing would be required and I'm pretty sure the writers didn't put any effort on that. In fact, every single character is paper-thin, and there are so many stereotypes it's impossible to keep count. Also, there are tons of characters whose only purpose is to fill the gaps left by the plot. 

The cast is pretty bad too. Most of the actors look like they don't even want to be in the film, the worst probably being Mike Epps and his atrocious acting and his inability to deliver jokes. King Bach was quite funny though and easily the highlight of the film. Too bad his character dies pretty soon. 

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The movie's genre is all wrong too. The filmmakers should have focused on one --comedy-- and completely forget about the other --horror-- as not a single "horror" element is effective. 

As for the comedy, it's a different story. Meet the Blacks may not have the most clever and witty of humour --there are indeed a lot of juvenile and over-used racist jokes that completely fall flat-- but it still manages to make you laugh or chuckle from time to time. It's not one of those movies that makes your stomach hurt because of how hard you're laughing, but it isn't dreadful either.