I dunno… the title of this movie makes no sense. There’s definitely a wedding… but no banquet. Maybe – and I’m stretching – there’s a brief banquet moment, but that’d be like renaming Star Wars to The Trash Compactor. But maybe it makes sense in relation to the original Ang Lee film from the 90s (which I haven’t seen).

Not that it matters… since this rom-com is perfectly fine with what it brings to the (non-banquet) table. It’s about a lesbian couple and a gay couple who are all good friends. One of the ladies is trying to get pregnant via IVF, one of the guys is worried his grandma is going to force him to move back to Korea. And then things get too complicated for this synopsis paragraph.

This is a perfectly charming rom-com that avoids all the cliches of rom-coms. So bonus points right out the gate. The cast is good with Bowan Yang, Kelly Marie Tran, Lily Gladstone, and Han Gi-Chan as our two couples… plus an assist by the excellent Youn Yuh-Jung as one of their grandmothers.

Youn’s presence is such a relief. She starts off as a stereotypical dragon lady grandma who is going to disapprove of these relationships. But the script and the actress pull a fast one and turn her into a three dimensional character. I liked her so much, I wanted more quiet sit-downs between her and the younger cast.

My only complaint is that more than half the direct jokes just didn’t land for me. The scenarios and the cast are funny and when they aren’t cracking wise, it’s quite amusing… but those obvious “punch up the script” gags just kept failing. Not always… there’s a few offhand zingers that worked plus a couple degrees of separation Star Wars joke that made me giggle (“NERD!”).

This is a pretty solid and charming film that may or may not be as good as the original. It stands on its own though with charming actors and some unexpected plotting/writing, especially for a rom-com. It’s worth checking out.

Score: 83