Review: The Wedding Video (15)

Billy Connolly famously surmised, “Marriage is a wonderful invention. Then again, so is a bicycle repair kit.”

His cynical words would certainly strike a chord with the church-bound characters in The Wedding Video, a comedy of appalling manners that witnesses a relationship come apart at the seams through the lens of the best man’s omnipresent camera.

Nigel Cole’s film amuses and charms in equal measure, relying on the excellent comic timing of the ensemble British cast led by Rufus Hound, who makes his big screen debut.

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Scriptwriter Tim Firth, who previously penned Calendar Girls, spares the characters few blushes as excitement and expectation turns to anguish and despair, laced with tender romance.

Shambolic oaf Raif (Hound) decides to make a video of his estranged brother Tim’s (Robert Webb) forthcoming nuptials as a present to the bride and groom.

The first surprise comes when Raif learns that Tim is engaged to Saskia (Lucy Punch), a booze-swigging wild child who was the scourge of their school, but now polished into a refined, young lady by her well-to-do mother, Alex (Harriet Walter).

However, as he spends more time with the soon-to-wed couple, Raif glimpses tiny cracks in their relationship.

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The Wedding Video captures the frenzied whirl in the weeks leading up to the “I do”, when even the tiniest setback can tip the bride or groom over the edge.

Webb and Punch are well matched as the happy couple and Walter purses her lips with gusto as she tries to trump her rivals.

Belly laughs walk down the aisle with touching sentiment and while there’s a certain inevitability to the climactic emotional devastation, it’s a bow to convention we merrily toast.