---

Like horror flicks or family films, Tyler Perry’s Madea movies — based on his enormously successful plays — are a genre unto themselves, which means one thing: Either you are going to see them or you are not, and no review will change your mind.

When Perry’s “Diary of a Mad Black Woman” was released last year, critics tore it apart and audiences ignored reviews, and made the movie a smash.

And so Perry is back, again presiding over a mind-boggling mash of broad comedy, tragic melodrama and spiritual sermonizing.

As before, a good woman (Rochelle Aytes) is mixed up with a bad man (Blair Underwood), and it will take Madea’s meddling to make things right.

Played in cheerful drag by Perry, Madea is a Southern, African-American matriarch guided by Christian values and a wicked sense of humour. She’s a kind of community adviser, teaching important lessons through messy, if intermittently moving, means.

We learn that an open home and an open heart will heal all wounds. That some men really want to be responsible and loving. And that a boiling pot of grits and a carefully wielded skillet will take care of the ones who don’t.

Perry makes sure villains get their comeuppance, while heroines get big, frilly weddings — with God, and an imperious Maya Angelou — presiding over it all.[[In-content Ad]]

---