Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Tyler Perry’s Divorce in the Black’ on Amazon Prime Video, Another Shabby Melodrama from the Prolific Media Mogul

From the Wow, He Just Keeps Cranking Out the Content file comes Tyler Perry’s Divorce in the Black, a pseudo-psycho-thriller that’s the media mogul’s first movie in his recent deal with Amazon Prime Video. Not only is Perry shockingly prolific, writing and producing and directing TV series and movies at an insane clip for a large and devoted audience, but now he’s simultaneously producing content for Netflix AND Amazon Prime Video, the highly competitive behemoths of the current Cold War among streaming services. Did I mention he also opened his own independent studio in Atlanta, and is a billionaire? Perry’s achievements are astonishing, really, and that extends to the ludicrousness of the melodramas he churns out seemingly by the gross; this one stars Meagan Good as a long-suffering woman who finally divorces her serial lout of a husband, with predictably, oh-so-Tyler-Perryesque nonsensical results. I dunno, maybe it’ll inspire a few laughs, intentional or otherwise (but most likely otherwise).

TYLER PERRY’S DIVORCE IN THE BLACK: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: We open with a funeral, for Ava’s (Good) brother-in-law. She married into the Bertrand family, a bunch of ne’er-do-wells who’ve long feuded with her parents, preacher-farmer Clarence (Richard Lawson) and devoted lady-of-Gawd Gene (Debbi Morgan). So Ava’s marriage to Dallas (Cory Hardrict) must be a real Montagues-and-Capulets type situation, right? Ehh. I dunno about that. She talked the Bertrands into letting Clarence conduct the eulogy, during which he pretty much just comes right out and says the deceased gentleman is gonna be eating fire and brimstone for all eternity. So much for ending all the fussin’ and a-feudin’. All Ava can do is cringe-and-facepalm as the Bertrands get so mad they pull the body right outta the casket so they can bury their boy where he belongs, just outside their cruddy mobile home, over yonder past all the old mattresses and husks of dead cars and miscellaneous assorted trash in the yard. 

And it’s not like Ava and Dallas’ love is particularly star-crossed. They moved to Atlanta from rural Wherever, Georgia to live their life of bliss, but it didn’t turn out that way. She got a good job doing Whatever at a big bank, and Dallas just drinks and smokes and beats her and psychologically abuses her. And now – get this – HE’S the one who wants a divorce. It goes against everything Ava learned from her parents, who stuck it out through better or worse, rich or poor, hot or cold, smelly or not smelly, poop on the bottom of your shoe or poop not on the bottom of your shoe. She’s stricken with guilt. Dallas careens out the door and she goes back home to Clarence and Gene for a while, staying in her perfectly preserved childhood bedroom which still has the Fresh Prince posters up over the bed. As a reminder of how craptastic it’s been for many years, her best friend and coworker Rona (Taylor Polidore) wrote down all the terrible things Dallas did, and it’s pretty small print with tight margins and everything. The guy’s a real creep.

Clarence and Gene are supportive of the split – so supportive, they pair her up with her old friend Benji (Joseph Lee Anderson), a farmer and divorcee who looks like he can carry half-ton steers over each shoulder without cracking the Right Guard seal on a single armpit. This involvement with Benji is when Dallas gets mad at the woman he’s divorcing for “cheating” on him, which only makes sense if you’re more plot device than man. Prior to this, Dallas disappeared for a remorselessly turgid hourlong stretch of the movie as Ava mopes around and thinks about sleeping with Benji but doesn’t but then eventually does, because she has to in order for this plot to hit Ludicrous Speed and get to the inevitable trademark Tyler Perry Batshit Ending. All of his “serious” movies conclude in this manner, you know. It’s right up there with death and taxes.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Let’s just say this isn’t quite Marriage Story. Heck, it’s not even A Madea Halloween.

Performance Worth Watching: Add Good to the growing pile of talented and capable actresses (see also: Taraji P. Henson, Alfre Woodard, Kelly Rowland, Crystal Fox) chewing their way through some of the toughest, stringiest beef-jerky dialogue ever.

Memorable Dialogue: Benji offers Ava some reassurance, and offers us some derisive chuckles, with this awkward exchange:

Benji: I do know what it’s like. Anger, betrayal, all of that. One minute you’re strong, and the next you’re looking at the bottom of a whiskey bottle and listening to the Chris Stapleton song ‘Either Way.’

Ava: Never heard it.

Sex and Skin: No naughty bits or glutes visible, but at least we get one of the clumsiest sex scenes ever filmed.

Our Take: And at least one of the clumsiest sex scenes ever filmed is immediately followed by one of the clumsiest fight scenes ever filmed. They make for quite the sequence, an ineptly executed mess that finally, at long, long last, breaks the tension Perry has spent 90 minutes ineptly attempting to build. Nearly two decades into his career as a film director has taught Perry nothing new about the craft, but the billion dollars in his bank account has enabled him to not care because people will watch this dreck anyway. It’s quite the feedback loop he’s created for himself.

And yet, Divorce in the Black – nonsense title, by the way – never truly achieves the level of overheated, bake-a-single-biscuit-by-burning-down-the-kitchen dramatic absurdity Perry gave us in the likes of A Fall From Grace, Mea Culpa, or Why Did I Get Married Too, which showed us just how thin the line between melodrama and comedy can be. He tames the bull in the china shop and ends up with a stultifyingly dull exploration of ill-formed characters working through their banal existences in Very Expensive Homes. All we can do is sit there and wait for everything to explodinate in the signature Perry style, and when it finally does, it’s two measly sparklers on the Fourth of July, and one of them fizzles. And in order to get there, we have to suffer through a logic-deprived screenplay in which you’ll be positively thirsting for a lick of sense. The only way to get through it is to take a drink every time someone on the screen does something dumb. You’ll be hammered in no time flat.

Our Call: You know what to expect from a Tyler Perry joint by now. But Divorce in the Black isn’t the hoot you want it to be. It doesn’t derail like a memorable trainwreck; rather, it poots out on the track. How disappointing. SKIP IT.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.