With his movie debut, Talbert plays to his established audience, the redemption message riding roughshod over everything, even such trifling concerns as character consistency and continuity.
First Sunday (2008)
Runtime: 1 hr 38 mins
Genre: Comedies
Starring: Ice Cube, Katt Williams, Tracy Morgan, Loretta Devine, Michael Beach
Screenwriter: David E. Talbert
Producer: David E. Talbert, David McIlvain, Tim Story, Ice Cube, Matt Alvarez
Composer: Stanley Clarke
DVD Info
Release:
Jun 5, 2008
Blu-ray Features:
- Anamorphic Widescreen - 1.85
Audio:
- Dolby Digital 5.1 - English, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Thai
- Subtitles - Arabic, Dutch, English, French, Korean, Mandarin, Portuguese, Spanish, Thai - Optional
Additional Release Material:
- Additional Audio Material - Camera Wrap Speech - David Talbert
- Audio Commentary David Talbert - Writer/Director
- Deleted Scenes / Extended Scenes
- Featurettes - HOOD ROBBIN' - First Sunday Cast and Crew
- Gag Reel
- Outtakes - 1. Katt Williams
- 2. Tiffany Pollard
Interactive Features:
- The Almighty Version Enhanced Fact Track
Reviews
The least funny man ever to make a career in comedy movies, Ice Cube hauls his sullen mug back in front of the cameras for the execrable First Sunday.
Cube's maudlin, overly precious relationship with his son hits a few sour notes, but Morgan's rubbery, half-crazy Leejohn always drags the film back into its manic, cartoony groove.
On your own day of judgement, select a better film from the listings.
Loretta Devine and Olivia Cole shine out as veteran members of the flock, but even their class combined is no saving grace.
Seasoned stars such as Loretta Devine and Regina Hall do their best...but it's an uphill struggle with a script even the good lord would rent asunder.
Grafting moral uplift on to a slapstick caper with mixed results, this nevertheless captures some of the giddy eccentricity of the Ealing comedies it haphazardly resembles.
Devilish satire outing felons who come in gaudy three piece suits too, a sweltering church 'hotter than Satan's toenails' and Sunday sermon sidebars that all the rest makes go down easy.
The missing-church-funds subplot will be easily figured out by any four year old, but it winds up being a McGuffin anyway.
With its unlikely but sweet-natured story, 'First Sunday' is a cut above most of the "January junk" that floods the theaters this time of year.
Getting religion in the end is no excuse for a parade of bad taste.
Ice Cube is now Public Enemy Number Fun, although First Sunday is only fun if you're in dire need of a modernist urban take on the strain of comedy Abbott and Costello used to practice, which, let's be honest, wasn't that funny to begin with.
Writer-director David E. Talbert has a fine cast...but he lets them down with a wretched, amateurish script...
If Tyler Perry ever wanted to turn Dog Day Afternoon into a treacly after-school special, it would probably end up looking a lot like this.
Ice Cube's franchising of the weekdays continues with First Sunday.
First Sunday isn’t the most refined moviemaking you’ll ever see, but it gives 2008 cinema a perfectly humane start.
Combining the hijinks of the Friday series with the spiritual bent of Tyler Perry's work seems like an obvious move. For producer/star Ice Cube, it's also a dishonest one.
First Sunday, a self-described 'funny and heartwarming comedy,' stumbles in the comedy department, but fills the heart's collection plate with a strong inspirational finish.
For a movie that's filled with so many talented comedians, it's shocking that First Sunday is only sporadically funny.
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