Diary of a Mad Black Woman – Blu-ray Review

It’s been five years since Tyler Perry burst into public awareness with Diary of a Mad Black Woman, a $5.5 million romantic dramedy that went on to gross over $50 million. Perry, who wrote the film from his own play and appeared as three characters in the movie, used the film’s success to catapult himself into the world of the Hollywood movers and shakers — currently resting upon an empire built from financially successful films, television shows, books and plays.

With Diary of a Mad Black Woman, Perry established himself as a film-making giant — that’s why it’s very easy to forget that the film, with its ham-fisted moral platitudes and niche-targeted comedy, isn’t very good. But you try telling that to the ever-growing legion of Tyler Perry fans.

Diary of a Mad Black Woman is the equivalent of a nice juicy brain to the legion of Tyler Perry zombies currently shambling throughout America. Sure you can try and show them the benefits of a spleen or pancreas but when it comes right down to it, there’s just no arguing with either zombies or the brain-dead, soulless ghouls who enjoy Tyler Perry films.

Kimberly Elise plays Helen McCarter, a woman whose only mark on the world has been as the wife of Charles, a hugely successful lawyer. Charles has given his wife everything — money, fine clothes and a huge home. But as the unfaithful husband givith, he can also taketh away. Because there’s no such thing as a emotionally complex character in the black and white world of Diary of a Mad Black Woman, when Charles decides to trade in his wife for a younger model, he does so in the most dickish of ways — tossing his wife out on the street without warning and without any financial support.

Left with nowhere to go, Helen shows up on the doorstep of her dear grandmother Madea (Tyler Perry in drag). Madea is the type of grating characters that people tiptoe around admitting they hate because they don’t want to be called a racist. But guess what? There’s nothing wrong in saying that Madea is almost unbearable to watch. Every ounce of the character is a stereotyped mess — no better than the blackfaced minstrel show characters that have been rightfully shunted off to the world of political incorrectness. With her quick temper, colorful colloquiums and “oh, so charming” catchphrases, I can kind of see why so many people have clung to Madea and embraced the character. Putting aside their obvious poor taste, these Madea-fans may recognize somebody from their own family in the grossly exaggerated, misshapen mutant that is Perry’s parody of an actual character. But just because George Lopez occasionally says things I used to hear my aunts and uncles say doesn’t mean I want to watch him for two hours.

When it comes right down to it, though, Diary of a Mad Black Woman isn’t that bad of a melodrama. Full of fiery passion, engaging situational conflict and some easily digestible cookie-cutter romance, the film hits most of the right notes as far as big screen soap operas go. What sends the film hurtling down to the ground in a Hidenburg-esque manner, though, are the scenes where Perry, either as Madea or as her equally noxious out-of-work, sexually rowdy brother Joe Baker, tries to do comedy.

The film’s humor is so broad and obnoxious that it seems as out of place in the rest of the film as if a dinosaur were to suddenly appear. Every time Madea or Joe makes an appearance, audiences are taken out of the movie and body slammed against the ground — where they proceed to puke up the bloody scraps of enjoyment they had just been chewing on.

If Perry and director Darren Grant could have shown restraint and toned back some of the sketch-material-level comedy, the movie could have actually been mostly enjoyable. The melodrama, as I said, is as juicy as a rare steak. When Helen’s ex-husband is shot by an angry client and left nearly completely paralyzed, Helen must choose between the new man in her life or the thrill she’ll find in torturing the monster who uprooted the life she had loved. Helen, naturally, chooses to give in to the dark side of the Force and spend her nights physically abusing her crippled ex-husband.

A 11^th hour noise-dive into hard-core proselytizing means audiences can’t expect the film to stay in this morally ambiguous, yet highly entertaining, shadowed world where cigarettes are put out on the arm of paralyzed ex-lovers but audiences can still enjoy the melodrama while it lasts before church choirs and deus ex machinas arrive to make everything a deep shade of bland again.

Diary of a Mad Black Woman has a very specific audience in mind. If you enjoy good, clean dramas about hard-working African-Americans overcoming personal strife to find happiness in their family and faith, you’re a better person than I am. You’ll also probably enjoy Diary of a Mad Black Woman — that is, of course, if you can look past the heavy coating of unfunny comedy the film has been caked in.

Diary of a Mad Black Woman is presented in 1080p high definition in a 1.78.1 widescreen ratio. The film’s low budget shows as the movie, only five years old, looks positively aged on Blu-ray. Nothing shines or gleams in high definition and the only enhancement given by the film’s new high definition release is a slightly richer color base.

The film’s soundtrack, an English 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio, on the other hand, sounds perfectly acceptable if unremarkable. Unless you’re a hardcore Tyler Perry fan, you can take a break from writing me hate mail to buy this new Blu-ray upgrade. Otherwise, just stick to the DVD.

All the special features are in standard definition.

The ATL — This 10 minute featurette explores the Atlanta film industry, in which Tyler Perry is a strong cornerstone of.

The Real Mad Black Women — A 17 minute, kind of amusing feature that essentially takes a dozen loud-mouthed women (some black, some white) and lets them give running commentary to the film’s plot.

Music Montages — Essentially a set of music videos featuring songs of the film set to scenes from the movie.

Reflections on Diary — Three minutes of Perry talking about the movie and his faith.

Audio Commentaries — The film features two commentaries. One is with Tyler Perry. The other features director Darren Grant and star Kimberly Elise.

Making of Diary of a Mad Black Woman — 21 minutes of promotional fluff featuring cast and crew interviews and behind the scenes footage.

Who’s Tyler Perry — In which Tyler Perry talks about himself. For 13 minutes. Enjoy.

Deleted Scenes — 21 minutes of deleted scenes, 10 in all. Nothing essential was left on the cutting room floor but none of the scenes are outright terrible either. These scenes are just more of the same mediocrity.

Outtakes — Four minutes of outtakes from the film.

Tyler Perry Spotlight — Another 12 minutes of Tyler Perry talking about himself. This guy seems determined to turn people into Tyler Perry zombies. Pass the brains?

You Can Do It … It’s Electric — A three minute tutorial on how to do the dance seen at Madea’s block party.

Photo Gallery

Diary of a Mad Black Woman is a film that has its supporters and its haters. For most audiences, though, the film is just going to flow off their backs like rain on a duck’s feathers. There’s nothing overly offensive about the film (aside from Madea, of course) and nothing overly remarkable. It’s just another niche market movie that’s made for a very specific kind of audience. None of the disc’s special features (all ported over from the previous DVD release) will help to convert new fans. This is a disc that most people will rightfully skip over while at the store. Those that do seek it out, though, should be mostly happy. It doesn’t improve upon the DVD in any real way but hey, if your taste is shot enough to the point where you like the movie itself, you’re probably not going to care about the lack of high definition sparkle or new extras.