A REALLY GOOD TALKING PIG MOVIE

A Video Review of "Muriel's Wedding"

Copyright 2003 Glenn Walker

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away I worked in a video store with my good friend Jim. He is a wonderful writer, poet and performance artist - and quite the wordsmith. My favorite quote from him concerns Muriel's Wedding.

"Three talking pig movies seem like too much for one year."

The inevitable straight man reply; "Three?"

"Yeah. Babe, Gordy and Muriel's Wedding."

It's a fat joke, and a cruel one. To Jim's defense he didn't say it to be offensive, just to be funny. As a matter of fact he is a vehement anti-sizist. It's nothing against Toni Collette who stars as Muriel who gained 40 pounds for the role. It's just the scary wardrobe she has. Everything is four sizes too small as if to make her look worse. Sometimes tight clothing equals talking pig.

Muriel's Wedding is the story of Muriel who runs away from a dysfunctional home life to Sydney to start over where she ends up marrying an Olympic swimmer so he can get his visa and conquers her own self- image problems. All things considered (and clothing aside) it's a great little movie filmed completely in Australia.

It's all about empowerment and getting what you want. It is well written and well acted. The only problem I really have with Muriel's Wedding is the soundtrack. If I ever wanted to hear this much Abba music at one time I'd go see "Mamma Mia!"

Despite all the mean things said above it's still quite good and worth seeing. After all, Muriel's Wedding is a really good talking pig movie.