YOU PEOPLE
★★★
OUT NOW (NETFLIX) / CERT 15 / 117 MINS
DIRECTOR Kenya Barris
CAST Jonah Hill, Lauren London, Eddie Murphy, Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Before their wedding, Ezra (Jonah Hill) and Amira (Lauren London) must first deal with the in-laws from hell. This is essentially Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner, given a fresh coat of 21st-century paint: not since Bradley Whitford wished for a third Obama term in Get Out has a white parent like Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ awkward mother made such uncomfortably cringey gestures to an interracial couple. Eddie Murphy’s Nation Of Islam father, meanwhile, is quietly hilarious: a terrifying, softly spoken patriarch who will “kill you and get a solid nine hours’ sleep”, as one character puts it. This is a romcom, so it is almost deliberately formulaic, with a final act so neat it could have been manicured. But at its best, You People is funny and insightful on America’s still-fractious racial divide.