Ricardo Darín stars as Rafael, the owner of a restaurant started by his father, who spends most of his time on his cell phone talking to purveyors and corporate reps who want to buy his family-owned business. He has little time to slow down and pay attention to those who should be most important to him – namely his girlfriend, his young daughter from a failed marriage and his mother who resides in a care facility suffering from advanced Alzheimer’s. When his father, Nino, comes to take Rafa to visit Norma it has already been a year since his last visit.
Already you can see the makings of a typical Hollywood morality tale and predictably two events occur which make him reevaluate his priorities. The first is the sudden arrival of Juan Carlos, an old childhood friend long absent. The second is a heart attack that lands him in intensive care for a considerably short stay. It is this second event which is the obvious catalyst for change. But when Juan Carlos reveals that he was married with a daughter until both died and then begins to insinuate himself into Rafa’s life, building a relationship with his girlfriend and daughter, there is a deeper revelation in Rafa of the need to make profound changes.
The title of the film refers to the new wedding that Nino wants to have with Norma. After more than 40 years of marriage, he wants to give her the gift he never gave her from the beginning which is to get married in a church. This plot development takes shape late in the film and provides the overly sentimental elements that may leave softer audience members a bit teary-eyed.
The sentimental plot isn’t the only aspect with Hollywood fingerprints on it. Juan Carlos serves as a kind of sad clown. Nearly every scene with him in it is played as comic relief, culminating in the wedding at the end in which, for reasons too complicated to get into, he plays the part of the officiating priest, giving a sermon that begins, “On the first day God created the Heavens and the Earth…” Surely it’s no coincidence that Eduardo Blanco, the actor portraying Juan Carlos, bears a striking resemblance to Roberto Benigni, the Italian actor who has made a successful career out of playing the clown.
It’s easy enough to see why Son of the Bride was so well received in the United States and how it was nominated for the Oscar. It reaffirms everything we want to believe about the world: that generally unpleasant people have the capacity to change; that human tragedy (in both a wife and mother with Alzheimer’s and a young man who lost his wife and child) can have its lighter moments and lead to better times; and that generally things always work out in the end even though it may not be exactly as planned. As pleasing an entertainment though it may be, I’m certainly pleased that Campanella went on to direct the far superior The Secret in Their Eyes.
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