“I dunno, they both look like cardboard cutouts. Has your brother moved yet?” she asked. He replied, “I doubt it, Mom was made of paper and Dad was a crude glue casting.”
The impact of Destination Wedding (2018) on me is much like how Groundhog Day (1993) affected me: predictable, silly … and teary-eyed charming. As the leads carried Groundhog Day, the leads of Destination Wedding provide the main lift for this mildly odd story – and it works.
A current-day destination wedding has been decreed for Keith, who we never meet, and brother Frank and Keith’s former fiancée, Lindsay, are invited. These two meet, for the first time, on the way to Keith’s wedding; why they’ve never met before is explained away as a consequence of Frank’s antipathy for Keith, and, in fact, neither of them care for Keith. Keith may be a real jerk, though it occurred to me that conclusion may be more the prism through which Frank and Lindsay view their worlds than a forthright commentary on the ever-faraway Keith.
Frank is the Cynic, questioning everything and putting the black spin on all the answers. Lindsay, still shattered at the breakup with Keith all these years later, is not so dark, and they soon fall to arguing, discussing, agreeing, disagreeing.
And, maybe, falling in love. I mean, they talk so much that you can’t really tell. It’s almost a philosophy seminar disguised as a movie.
Found in the rom-com bin at the store, Destination Wedding may have some hidden currents in it for the philosophy major, while still getting laughs for the casual viewer. You may not remember this cute story a week post-viewing – but, then again, depending on your intellectual composition, you may.
Enjoy.
