Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All by Myself

One could, rather uncharitably, point out that Perry, a veritable one-man movie factory, has previously done bad, all by his bad self, in some of his previous critically reviled productions. But this latest offering continues a trend toward increasingly mature moviemaking from the actor/writer/director. Yes, we still get Perry vamping as Madea, that hulking, house-coated nag, but only in brief, giggling jags that break up a melodrama about familial duties and self-actualization. Actually, Perry's drag bits are pretty damn funny, as when Madea recounts a Bible story about Peter, one of the "12 disciplines," that nonsensically weaves in other parables and finally wends its way to "Noah's arch" – you know, the one in St. Louis. On the befuddled receiving end of Madea's tale is Jennifer (Wilson, nuanced and quite moving), a sullen 16-year-old who is more or less raising her two younger brothers. When their grandmother goes missing, Jennifer and her brothers are dumped on the doorstep of Aunt April (Henson), a hard-drinking torch singer not at all interested in her new gig as de facto guardian. On the very same day, a hunky handyman immigrant named Sandino (CSI: Miami's Rodriguez) comes on as April's basement boarder, and suddenly, very reluctantly, April must kick open the doors to both her home and her deeply hardened heart. But not at first: If Henson (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) weren't such a likable screen presence, her character would be difficult to tolerate, so screechy and unsympathetic is she. Redemption, of course, is inevitable – and Perry frankly takes too much time getting there – but I Can Do Bad benefits from a number of musical performances from a smoldering Henson and co-stars Blige, Knight, and Marvin Winans, who also wrote the film's emotional high mark, the gospelized "Just Don't Wanna Know/Over It Now."