Rating: 
Summary: Charming and touching
Review: Not entirely a comic movie because of the hard-won emotional battles
Muriel fights, this movie nonetheless has moments of high
hilarity.Muriel lives with her family in Porpoise Spit,
Australia. Her family is a walking ad for dysfunction:her sleazy
politician father, her sad and out-of-it mother, and her siblings who
are the ultimate couch potatoes. Muriel herself, a big hulking young
woman, has been unemployed for two years since she flunked out of
secretarial school and often retreats to her room to endlessly listen
to Abba songs. When an old schoolmate, Rhonda, re-enters her life,
Muriel's life takes a turn for the better. (Rhonda is played by Rachel
Griffiths, who was brilliant in "Me, Myself, I"). The two
girls move to Sydney where Muriel (by now calling herself Mariel)
begins to have some semblance of a normal existence. Normal, that is,
if it is normal to visit every bridal shop in the city, try on gowns,
have your picture taken, and put these photos in a wedding album. For,
you see, Mariel/Muriel is obsessed with getting married. Highly
recommended. By the end of the movie, Muriel has learned to value herself and find happiness and validation from within. She also becomes much more
attractive, a reflection of her inner self and her newfound confidence.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Movie
Review: Toni Collette plays an awkward, clumsy woman named Muriel who fantasizes about getting married and listens to ABBA. Living in Porpoise Spit, she has no life of her own. She, as well as her family, are mentally abused by the father, a philandering politician who will do anything to gain popularity. The group of women that she hangs around with, don't want her around because she doesn't live up to their standards--beautiful and stupid. While on vacation, she meets with a high school friend, Rhonda.
Before her performance in "Six Feet Under", Rachel Griffiths plays Rhonda, a high school friend of Muriel's who is transformed into a swan. The popular quartet accepts her but she rejects them because of their cruel treatment of her in high school. She and Muriel move to Sidney, and Muriel starts anew. But when Rhonda is hit with cancer, Muriel goes back into her dreams of being a bride. Muriel does marry but for the wrong reasons. Muriel is forced to confront herself, her family, and the people in her life that hurt her emotionally.
This movie deals with acceptance and Muriel had to accept that there were some things you could and couldn't change.
Rating:
Summary: Porpoise Spit Sheila's Move It On Over To Big City Sidney!
Review: Australian writer/director P.J. Hogan's modern masterpiece, "Muriel's Wedding" serves up wedding cake with wheelchairs, confetti with cancer, ABBA with ardor, sweetness with stealing, and more importantly friends with foes in this one of a kind black comedy. "Muriel's Wedding" not only launched P.J. Hogan's directing and writing career but gave a leg up to Toni Collette who agreed to pack on 30 lbs. for the once in a lifetime role of Muriel Heslop, citizen of small town Porpoise Spit, Australia. Rachel Griffiths from "Six Feet Under" also got her first shot playing Muriel's friend, wild child and general black sheep of Porpoise Spit, Rhonda Epinstalk. Rhonda and Muriel escape the small town and small people of Porpoise Spit for the big city lights and acceptance of Sidney, Australia. A low self-esteemed wedding obsessed wannabe, Muriel lies, cheats and steals her way to her ultimate goal. Getting HITCHED! At least that's what Muriel thinks she desires, but all she wants is to truly be accepted by friends, family and her WHOLE world. Muriel's whole existence is based on "Why Can't It Be Me? Why Can't I Be The One?" Muriel's parents, Bill and Betty Heslop, played by Aussie actors Bill Hunter and Jeanie Drynan both turn in excellent and believable performances. Especially Jeanie Drynan as the put upon mother who unconditionally loves her children and only wants to think the best of them. Also featured are four judgemental and witchy women who are Muriel and Rhonda's former high school classmates. Some of the greatest comedy scenes take place between the six gals and are hilarious! The film ALSO has a GREAT 70's soundtrack with the likes of: Sugar Baby Love by The Rubettes
We've Only Just Begun by The Carpenters
Tide Is High by Blondie
Waterloo by ABBA
I Go to Rio by Peter Allen
I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself by Dusty Springfield
Dancing Queen by ABBA
I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do by ABBA
and Happy Together by The Turtles I highly recommend this film not just as a "chick flick" but a great and terrific movie that examines not only the comedic side of life but of true friendship, love and death... Happy Watching And Go Porpoise Spit High!
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic laughs from this wonderful movie!
Review: This is a truly funny/ sad drama movie, often hilarious, featuring typical Aussie humour, that is better appreciated with multiple viewings
Being a fellow Australian, I can get most of the jokes straight away, as some of the humour is quite subtle.
Some of the humour is obviously more overt, as the story basically follows the life of a young woman called " Muriel" whose sole aim in life is to get married- thinking that this will make her happy, and her life complete.
She lies, cheats and steals her way to first, a holiday on an island, then she moves away from her parents to start a new life in a new town.
She gets her wish and is finally married, but not to spoil for all who haven't seen it yet, let's just say, that she is not as happy as she thought she would be.
Moving in parts, this is extremely well written, and has a fabulous soundtrack of songs, including many by ABBA which is Muriels favourite group.
A great movie, and well worth a look!
Thanks for reading
Rating:
Summary: Thumbs Up to Down Under for a Great Film!
Review: The only complaint I have about Muriel's Wedding is that it was promoted as a comedy, and I feel that is a gross libel to the movie. The movie is far too rich with too many elements to be reduced to calling it just a comedy. It has the character of a drama with many comic moments, but to call it a comedy trivializes a great movie.
The movie opens as the bouquet descends at a wedding in Porpoise Spit, a seaside town in Australia that is little more than beaches and shopping malls. The one who catches it, Muriel Heslop (Toni Colette), is the girl least likely to be married, as the other girls are quick to tell her. Dumpy and plain, Muriel is the embarrassment of her clique of pinup-class girls who soon tell her they want nothing to do with her.
Muriel's woes are shared by her entire family. Her father (Bill Hunter), a less-than-successful politician, takes all his frustrations out on the rest of his family members, most of whom seem to spend their time in their respective dream worlds. Muriel spends her time listening to ABBA songs, looking at bridal gowns, and making up stories about getting married, when no prospects exist in reality. Along comes Deidre Chambers (Gennie Nevinson), a friend of her father's, who gives Muriel her big chance -- but not the one that her father thinks she is getting. She takes two blank checks from her parents' bank account, allegedly to buy supplies from Deidre to sell cosmetics, and in the next scene, Muriel appears at a vacation resort, enjoying the holiday that the girls who told her to take a hike are having. It is at the resort that Muriel runs into an old classmate, Rhonda Epinstalk (Rachel Griffiths), a feisty, flirtatious woman who mistakenly assumes that Muriel is there to have "a last fling" before getting married. Muriel actually begins to believe in the fable she has created, and she starts to turn into a very different woman than the crushed, broken spirit that left Porpoise Spit only a short time ago.
Muriel and Rhonda surface again in Sydney, where they have moved and are now living the life of two bachelor girls living life on the town. The exhilaration ends abruptly when Rhonda has an accident that reveals she has cancer, and shortly thereafter, Muriel's father tracks her down. Confronted by her father and later by Deidre with the fact that she stole the money from the bank account, Muriel realizes that her father is having an affair behind her mother's back. The world that Muriel had found for herself is starting to crumble, and at this point, through a classified ad she meets David Van Arckle (Daniel Lapaine), a South African athlete needing to marry an Australian national so that he can remain in the country to participate in the Olympic games. The meeting is purely a business arrangement, and the marriage is a marriage of convenience, but Muriel happily participates in the elaborate affair, totally unconcerned that she has become just as artificial as the girls back in Porpoise Spit who once rejected her. Rhonda, now confined to a wheelchair, must return to Porpoise Spit, and the relationship has soured because of the lack of sincerity that Muriel has shown in her actions.
When Muriel's mother (Jeanie Drynan) absent mindedly walks out of a discount store without paying, her husband comes to the police station to bail her out but takes the opportunity to tell her that he is leaving her to be with Deidre. Muriel gets a call telling her to come to Porpoise Spit immediately; her mother has died. At the funeral, there is a moment of truth for everyone in the family. Muriel runs out, overcome, and her husband has come for her. She realizes she cannot continue in the marriage and bids him farewell. Her sister (Gabby Millgate) tells her that her mother committed suicide, and her father tells her that Deidre will not be with him now. Muriel finally speaks to her father not as an inferior but as an equal adult; she has found herself.
In the final scene, Muriel goes to the Epinstalk home, where she goes to tell Rhonda she wants to take her back with her to Sydney. Rhonda is with the other airhead girls that she and Muriel detested, and in a second, Rhonda agrees to go with Muriel. The friendship is on again, and back to Sydney they go, leaving behind the shallow world of Porpoise Spit.
Toni Colette probably never dreamed she would make such a splash with this role. She had to gain 30 pounds to play the role, which was a major sacrifice, but it was not just that effort that made her performance so special. Bill Hunter and Jeanie Drynan play their parts masterfully and convincingly as Muriel's parents. Gabby Milgate's part gives her so little in terms of lines to say, but even so, she is unforgettable when she appears. Rachel Griffiths is superb throughout, managing to give the character of Rhonda depth, warmth, and wit in the relationship that ultimately turns Muriel from a social misfit into "the woman she always was," to quote the words of the promos that came out when the film premièred in 1995.
Rating:
Summary: A Sublime Comic Study of Inadequacy, Cancer and Suicide
Review: Muriel, who is in her twenties and has never had a boyfriend or a proper job, lives in the miserable Australian small town of Porpoise Spit a life whose bleakness is relieved only by her beloved old Abba records. The film begins at the wedding of one of the horrendous shallow women she thinks are her friends. She catches the bouquet but is firmly asked to hand it to someone else because, well, "Who would ever want to marry you?" Then she spots one of the bridesmaids shagging the groom in a back room. Then the police come round and arrest her for shop-lifting: the dress she is swearing appears to be stolen. Then it just keeps getting worse.
This is just wonderful. It's a grotesquely dark comedy about everything that is grim and vicious and ugly and awful in human life. It's set in a world people by a gallery of magnificently drawn dysfunctional characters so vivid and perfectly realized it is one of very few films for which the adjective `Dickensian' is altogether apt. But while it's a comedy about some appallingly messed up people the comedy it is hugely compassionate and never cynical or cruel - at lest except when dealing with Muriel's unspeakable high School peer group, self-styled beautiful people, who, unlike all the other characters, show no sign of insecurity or self-doubt and are quite cruel enough themselves to be due a little cruelty in turn.
Toni Colette's performance as Muriel has been widely praised to the skies and rightly - it's altogether perfect, very funny and very truthful. But every performance is superb: Bill Hunter and Jeanie Drynen as Muriel's very human but hopelessly failed parents; Gabby Millgate as her sister - she has almost no lines except repeated utterances of `You're terrible, Muriel' but she utters this so magnificently she steals her every scene; and Rachel Griffiths, magnificent and hilarious as Rhonda whose deep and genuine friendship is to be Muriel's salvation. The darkness of the comedy if perfectly judged. There are scenes so grim they don't really seem to belong in any sort of comedy and scenes that are impossibly, side-splittingly funny and the fit between the two is one of seamless harmony. And indeed, in many ways this is not such a dark film at all: it's an ultimately optimistic and unbeat - but entirely unsentimental - vision of the possibilities life may hold even for people who think, as Muriel does, that they are `useless' or `nothing'.
Rating:
Summary: The best Australian movie ever!
Review: I don't know how high a praise that is, but Muriel's Wedding is a great film! What makes this film stand out from the typical Hollywood factory is the incredible acting talents of Toni Collette, Rachel Griffiths, and the rest of the cast, the sharp writing that keeps the movie from being 'too sweet,' and the awesome soundtrack by Abba, which seems like a character of it's own! You don't have to like Abba to appreciate this wonderful movie. Toni Collette's performance is a true tour-de-force. Don't let this movie pass you by!
Rating:
Summary: Don't miss out on this
Review: Muriel Heslop (Toni Colette, "Sixth Sense") is an ABBA loving shoplifter whose father (Bill Hunter, "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert")is a crooked politician in Porpoise Spit, Australia. Dad brandishes every one of his offspring "useless", and they respond by living up to his accusations. Muriel, however, has dreams of a wedding (if not necessarily marriage), as she feels it will mean she's a success. But when she meets up with an old high school alumni named Rhonda (Rachel Griffiths, "Six Feet Under"), she high tails it to Sydney (with 13,000 dollars of her Dad's money) to start a new life. She changes her name to Mariel, gets an apartment with Rhonda, and becomes, as she puts it, a new person. But life has some changes in store that even she can't control, as Rhonda is diagnosed with a tumor on her spine and faced with possibly being paralyzed.
"Muriel's Wedding" follows Rhonda's rehabilition, Mariel's obesession with trying on wedding dresses, and eventually, her farce of a wedding to a South African athlete who must marry an Austrailian woman to swim in the olympics. But marriage is not all it's cracked up to be, and the death of her mother brings Muriel back to Porpoise Spit- and her senses. Excellent film, lots of laughs and great soundtrack (I'm not a huge ABBA fan, but I find myself singing their tunes under my breath every time I watch this).
Rating:
Summary: You're terrible, Muriel!!
Review: I love this movie! Watching Muriel TRANSFORM from an ugly duckling to something she wanted to be is quite moving. She had her shot and she took it and in the end she had made the better choice. This is a charming movie that introduced the beautiful Rachel Griffiths and immenesly talented Toni Collette.
This movie will make you laugh and then cry, then cheer, laugh again, cry once more and finally fall in love with the characters! Plus ABBA on the soundtrack!!!
Rating:
Summary: Porpoise Spit Sheila's Move It On Over To Big City Sidney!
Review: Australian writer/director P.J. Hogan's modern masterpiece, "Muriel's Wedding" serves up wedding cake with wheelchairs, confetti with cancer, ABBA with ardor, sweetness with stealing, and more importantly friends with foes in this one of a kind black comedy. "Muriel's Wedding" not only launched P.J. Hogan's directing and writing career but gave a leg up to Toni Collette who agreed to pack on 30 lbs. for the once in a lifetime role of Muriel Heslop, citizen of small town Porpoise Spit, Australia. Rachel Griffiths from "Six Feet Under" also got her first shot playing Muriel's friend, wild child and general black sheep of Porpoise Spit, Rhonda Epinstalk. Rhonda and Muriel escape the small town and small people of Porpoise Spit for the big city lights and acceptance of Sidney, Australia. A low self-esteemed wedding obsessed wannabe, Muriel lies, cheats and steals her way to her ultimate goal. Getting HITCHED! At least that's what Muriel thinks she desires, but all she wants is to truly be accepted by friends, family and her WHOLE world. Muriel's whole existence is based on "Why Can't It Be Me? Why Can't I Be The One?" Muriel's parents, Bill and Betty Heslop, played by Aussie actors Bill Hunter and Jeanie Drynan both turn in excellent and believable performances. Especially Jeanie Drynan as the put upon mother who unconditionally loves her children and only wants to think the best of them. Also featured are four judgemental and witchy women who are Muriel and Rhonda's former high school classmates. Some of the greatest comedy scenes take place between the six gals and are hilarious! The film ALSO has a GREAT 70's soundtrack with the likes of: Sugar Baby Love by The Rubettes
We've Only Just Begun by The Carpenters
Tide Is High by Blondie
Waterloo by ABBA
I Go to Rio by Peter Allen
I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself by Dusty Springfield
Dancing Queen by ABBA
I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do by ABBA
and Happy Together by The Turtles I highly recommend this film not just as a "chick flick" but a great and terrific movie that examines not only the comedic side of life but of true friendship, love and death... Happy Watching And Go Porpoise Spit High!
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