tHe tensions of a man and a woman about to get married are universal-especially when the family and friends are not entirely sure this is the best match. In this movie, however, the specifics are strictly South African. Ayanda (Zandile Msutwana) urges her intended, a sweet lug named Elvis (Kenneth Nkosi), to hurry to Capetown from Johannesburg and Elvis thinks he has all the time in the world — five whole days to cover a few hundred miles — but he's not counting on buses that leave without him, a best man (Rapulana Seiphemo) whose girlfriend slashes their tires, and a granny who decides she'll skip the wedding but send a goat instead.
Oh, and then there's the hitchhiking English tourist (Jodi Whittaker) the groom and best man reluctantly rescue in the middle of nowhere. Having just discovered that her fiance slept with her best friend, she launches into a lengthy why-would-anyone-get-married? rant before discovering her rescuers are heading to Elvis' nuptials.
It's easy to imagine how wrong this movie could go: how it could become all about race, how the groom's misadventures could make it feel like The Hangover played sideways, how the five languages spoken in the film could make the story splinter into pieces.
But White Wedding is about connections, and it has the good sense to pull them together in a film that's sweet, inclusive and sunny, a charmer filled with people who seem every bit as surprised as we are when they manage to look past surface differences, and find reasons to bond. The movie is sweet rather than slick and that makes all the difference.
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