A frothy romp, encompassing all those aspects of the human condition designed by a bored deity for the amusement of pilgrims trudging the road to happy destiny: nudity, the institution of marriage, and the question that has bedevilled the Boy Scout movement since Baden Powell's day: whether to jerk off inside or outside the communal tent. But for this critic the film was lifted out of the ordinary by the virtuoso performance of B. McCaughley (as B. McCaughly) as father of the bride. I thought he brought to the role a perfect balance between the gravitas, the graceful aplomb, of a James Robertson Justice and the elfin charm of an arthritic David Norris. His performance will come as no surprise to stage cognoscenti, who will not easily forget Honey, Well I shrunk the Kids (1980), or the hilarious frilly-knickers tour-de-force Under the Boardwalk (1991). And breathes there a cinema buff who has not gripped the edge of his tip-up seat throughout the thrilling 2002 suspense drama The Smoking Hoover? But it is a sad measure of the parochialism of the Irish cinema scene that this splendid thespian is nowadays better known among the tattooed and bearded roughnecks of the Oakland chapter than among the Great Unwashed in the one-and-thruppenies here at home.
