Video Beaverhausen: Tammy with Melissa McCarthy

The Princess of Plus-Size, Melissa McCarthy, stars in Tammy. Not a remake of the Debbie Reynolds film of the same name. Susan Sarandon, Toni Collette, Kathy Bates, Allison Jenney, Dan Aykroyd and Gary Cole are in it too, which is a good thing. I believe Melissa-as-Tammy has extra "fat" padding for this characterization, so there's more of her to love. Or not, as it turns out.

As with most road movies with a picaresque chain of events, this dumb-gets-dumber comedy gets tiresome early on.... despite the talent involved. Stabs at pathos don't work, sadly, coming off as spurious and condescending to the audience.

Directed by Ben Falcone who directed McCarthy in her breakthrough role in Bridesmaids, this film really doesn't have a script has grounded in reality or characters as believable as in that other film.

While the movie held my interest to the end, mostly because of the performances, Tammy may be more of a parody of working-class women than a celebration, in my humble opinion. It's a road trip comedy with a madly disenfranchised character that, like most of its ilk, taxes our patience like an obnoxious passenger we're forced to share time with. For Ms McCarthy, this movie is an embarrassment. She deserves much better than a third-rate girls-behaving-bady vehicle.