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Martin Lawrence, James Earl Jones, Margaret Avery, Mo’Nique Ines, Mike Epps, Cedric the Entertainer, Nicole Ari Parker, Michael Clarke Duncan. Written and directed by Malcolm D. Lee. Rated PG-13. 114 minutes. Universal Pictures.

I laughed—a lot—in the new Martin Lawrence homecoming movie Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins, an often outrageous slapstick comedy about a big shot Hollywood TV-host and best-selling author returning to his roots and colorful family for his parents 50^th wedding anniversary. It’s a real hoot, and while it may be strewn with a few juvenile hijinks, when it works, it really works.

"Team of Me" author and talk show host RJ Stevens (Lawrence) has it all—hit show, #1 book, expensive lifestyle, ten-year-old son (Damani Roberts) and Survivor-champ fiancée (Joy Bryant). Reluctantly summoned to a Georgia family reunion celebrating his folks’ (James Earl Jones, Margaret Avery) 50^th wedding anniversary, the old adage about not being able to go home again becomes a painfully reality of old grudges and childhood rivalries resurfaced.

His stern father resents his slick lifestyle, name change and wonders where they went so wrong. And while mom, the great Margaret Avery (unforgettable in The Color Purple), is forgiving, the arrival of beloved adopted cousin Clyde (Cedric the Entertainer), a car dealership magnate, opens unhealed wounds about the girl who got away (stunning Nicole Ari Parker), leading to a knock-down obstacle course rematch that goes memorably over the top in its adolescent rivalry gone wild. 

Immediately, uber-competitive and shallow fiancée Bianca doesn’t fit in with the down-home clan—spaced-out cousin Reggie (Mike Epps), brassy sister Betty (Mo’Nique Ines) and hulking brother Otis (Michael Clarke Duncan). Tensions develop as Roscoe vainly attempts to gain the family’s respect, which has eluded him since childhood. Lawrence is effective here, riding the line between zaniness and ultimately sentiment in the film’s finale.

But Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins belongs to the cyclonic comedienne Mo’Nique, who overtakes the film with pizzazz every time she enters the frame. As loud and proud sister Betty, she unleashes a string of broadly funny verbal tirades right up until the closing credits. She is a clown supreme, unafraid to look foolish and delivering sass with such ferocity—such as one scene where she is unexpectedly surprised in the shower—that you can’t help but go along for the ride. Writer/director Malcolm D. Lee, mounting a colorful and crassly entertaining movie, stands back and lets her rip, and the results are riotous.

For certain, Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins is little more than a silly Hollywood dot-to-dot of forgiveness and reconciliation that pauses long enough for someone to get sprayed by a skunk, animals to have overheated sex and grown men to indulge in humiliating pratfalls about every 15 minutes. Did I mention the tacked-on, feel good ending?  No matter. The movie is simply a fast-paced good time, and it left me feeling warm, fuzzy and all that good stuff, aware of its manipulations. Atonement it ain’t, but that’s all right by me.

For a movie filled with stereotypes and gross-out gags, Lawrence’s family values monologue in the final scene, however cliché, hits the mark. And it doesn’t hurt that director Lee wisely puts Margaret Avery and James Earl Jones together onscreen, who can pretty much sell anything.  The film has a lot of fun at its characters’ expeses, then asks us to take them seriously in the end, just about having it both ways. 

And for the record, if there’s a more beautiful actress in the movies today than Nicole Ari Parker, I sure haven’t found her. She can hold a close-up with the best of them, and has such feminine grace and goodness here that the film gets a big lift whenever she’s onscreen.   

Recommended, with a few reservations.   

- Lee Shoquist