'A Day Late And A Dollar Short'
(Whoopi Goldberg, Ving Rhames, Arnold Pinnock, Lyriq Bent, John Bourgeoisn, et al / DVD / NR / 2014 / Lionsgate)
Overview: Based on Terry McMillan's best-selling novel, the Lifetime Original Movie 'A Day Late And A Dollar Short' star Whoopi Goldberg as irascible matriarch Viola Price. When Viola learns that her next asthma attack is likely to kill her, she sets out to fix her fractured family.
DVD Verdict: As Viola herself admits early on, "There's a whole lot of mess I have to clean up before I go." Viola (Goldberg) is the matriarch of a family that has fallen apart. Her kids all hate each other, the husband has found a new woman and no one likes her anymore. After a health scare she is given news that changes her life.
On the verge of death she decides it time to fix her family before it's too late. I will start with yes this is a Lifetime movie, and yes I am a guy, and yes I actually did enjoy it. That said though it was a little too sappy for me. I think, like most movies lately, when another movie that is about the same thing comes out comparisons begin. This one is very much like 'August Osage County' in plot and theme.
While this movie was good and worth seeing August was so much better. Seeing that one first may have affected how I felt about this one, but August had deeper relationships and just felt like a more complete movie. It may have been because it was a made-for-TV movie but this felt really thin compared to the other one.
All that said though the movie is good and if you haven't seen August then you may like this more then I did. Overall, a good movie worth seeing, but once again a movie suffers from being too identical to a recent movie. This is a Widescreen Presentation (1.85:1) enhanced for 16x9 TVs.
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