Appetizing, home-cooked Sunday dinners save a family in stress in writer & director George Tillman, Jr.'s autobiographical movie "Soul Food," an emotionally satisfying but occasionally saccharine tour-de-force family melodrama. Comparisons with "Waiting to Exhale" are inevitable, but "Soul Food" shuns a sexist agenda that attributes its many ills to one sex at the expense of the other. Neither men nor women escape the devastating toll of the storyline. An ensemble cast of charismatic performers, an entertaining plot that alternates happy moments with tragic episodes, and Tillman's imaginative helming gives "Soul Food" a memorable if sometimes schmaltzy appeal.
Eating Sunday dinner at Mother Joe's house constitutes an age-old family tradition for three Chicago, Illinois, based sisters, Teri (Vanessa L. Williams of "Eraser"), Maxine (Vivica A. Fox of "Batman & Robin"), and Bird (Nia Long of "Friday"). Mother Joe (Irma P. Hall of "Mo' Money") lives to indulge her quarrelsome trio of daughters as much as her adorable grandchildren. Her favorite is Maxine's oldest son, Ahmad (Brandon Hammond of "Mars Attacks"). Tillman filters the poignant story of this family from the juvenile perspective of Ahmad.
As "Soul Food" unfolds, Bird has just married Lem (Mekhi Phifer of "Clockers"), a guy whose criminal record has already cost him his job. As the elder sister, Teri acts as the chief financial genius of the family. She has an eye and a heart for dollars. As an affluent attorney, Teri has bankrolled her youngest sister Bird in the beauty parlor business. Teri also supervises her mother's estate and manages the family's purse strings in woebegone times. Teri never lets anybody forget her pecuniary sacrifices, especially Maxine. Teri's overwrought attitude alienates her younger sister Maxine. Rivals since high school, Maxine stole Teri's boyfriend and took him to the altar. While Teri persevered with her college education, Maxine dropped out. Her husband Kenny (Jeffrey D. Sams of "Waiting to Exhale") and she started their own family. Two girls and a boy later, they have managed to survive on Kenny's blue-collar salary with no ill effects.
Teri struggles to make her second marriage a success, but her greed and holier-than-thou attitude sabotage her well-intentioned efforts. Eventually, Teri's attitude jeopardizes her marriage to Miles (Michael Beach of "White Man's Burden"). Although Miles and she are both well-heeled attorneys, he has been bitten by the music bug. Miles wants to form a jazz band, something Teri holds in utter contempt. She argues that Miles could be earning more money at the bar—the legal bar. No matter how much these sisters bicker, they always show up for Sunday dinner at Mother Joe's house. No sooner has Tillman set up the plot than he introduces a string of predicaments that starts with Mother Joe's tragic trip to the doctor. It seems that the indestructible matriarch must have a leg removed or she will die. Reluctantly, Mother Joe consents to surgery. During the operation, she suffers a stroke and slips into a coma. The sisters maintain a vigil at Mother Joe's bedside, but their relationship continues to sour. They argue over Mother Joe's hospital bills, and the traditional Sunday dinner is the casualty of their rage. Young Ahmad doesn't understand the family fracas. He doesn't understand why Teri and Miles have drifted apart or why Lem has been arrested and jailed for brandishing a firearm in a bar.
Ahmad holds his own vigil at his grandmother's beside. If Mother Joe cannot physically reunite the fragmented family, then perhaps Ahmad can. The ambitious youngster cooks up a plan that he is certain will bring the family back together for a traditional Sunday dinner. Nothing particularly original distinguishes "Soul Food" from a hundred or so similar family melodramas. The formulaic Tillman script plunges each character into a soup of despair. Indeed, "Soul Food" would rate as little more than an ethnic potboiler were it not for Tillman's nimble directing. Although the soap opera storyline alternates one sister's plight with another sister's predicament, the characters are so believably drawn and the atmosphere so filled with genuine sentiment that the film succeeds in spite of its clichés. At times, "Soul Food" degenerates into plain, old-fashioned mush. A subplot involving an elderly, anti-social relative named Uncle Pete (John M. Watson, Sr. of "Groundhog Day") who hides in his upstairs bedroom is pretty warmed-over. Ahmad's plan to reunite a family as suspicious as each of these relatives is seems a little far-fetched, too. Although "Soul Food" is a movie about a family, some of its content may not be appropriate for all family members, especially juveniles.
The performances are all marvelous. Each cast member plays a substantial, flesh-and-blood character with hopes and dreams. Hall steals the early scenes as Mother Joe. When one of Lem's curvaceous old flames threatens to disrupt Bird's wedding reception, Mother Joe adroitly rescues her son-in-law without stirring up discord. Mother Joe's speech about how one finger accomplished less than a knuckled-up fist is one of the movie's rousing highlights. Williams has the plum role as the materialistic sister who always gets the rough end of the stick. As her chief rival, Fox is less materialistic and more maternal. Phifer brings credible dimensions to his role as an ex-convict who faces the same song and dance from every employer who is afraid to hire him.
You don't have to be African-American to appreciate "Soul Food." Although the movie is aimed at mainstream black audiences, the problems that this family confronts are universal to any family. Ultimately, the sympathetic characters and the rich atmosphere of loving kindness that permeates the action compensate for the sappy story. Tillman boosts things immensely by rejecting a happily-ever-after ending, give the film a significance that it otherwise might lack.
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