How Stella Got Her Groove Back (1998)

Perfect cast and a good story

best movie i've ever seen.

A Disappointing Continuation

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Picture if you will, Stella (Angela Bassett). She's single...she's rich...she's got a great job--but, alas, no "on paper" man in her life that will make her feel complete. So, she goes off to Jamaica with her oldest and dearest friend (Whoopi Goldberg) in desperate search of her "groove." In the land of sand and sunlight, she happens upon Winston Shakespeare (Taye Diggs), who is half her age and finer than frog hair, and she is in a dilemma about exactly how she should handle the situation. I wish I had her problems, trust me.If I were Stella and had someone like Winston chasing after me, I'd be on him faster than a duck on a june bug...however, practical Stella is all caught up on the age thing...is anyone still with me? He's hot, he's young, and he's after me, and I'm going to QUESTION that? My first question would be where do we put the furniture, but, no--it takes the death of a good friend to make her embrace the fact that she should give into something as, uh-hem, debatable as Taye Diggs...OK, ladies, are you with me? In unison--"GIVE ME A BREAK!" If you're still on the fence, rewind and watch that pool scene again. I'm waiting. OK--now, we're all on the same page.This premise is flawed as flawed can be. I don't care if she has a child--any woman with a child should have her thinking cap firmly in place atop her head to know if he was a true, purebred dog, you'd have known it by the next morning, and still wow your girlfriends with the tale. He has been nothing but gallant, and yet we're supposed to sympathize with her...I don't think so.Stella creates her own drama while most of us would have been riding off into the sunset. In the end, the Terry McMillan autobiographical version didn't go EXACTLY as planned, but, hey, in a perfect world Stella had it going on from the get go. The "groove" could be, and in the movie was, reaffirmed in the shower. If my only problem is we don't like the same movies, I can assure you I would have forgotten about it by the first shower scene. But, if having to see Regina King made it all work out, I'm all for it. She's great as always.

Angela Bassett does an outstanding job. To those of you who can't understand why Stella needs her groove back, you have only to look up the word mundane. No matter how much money you have or Chanel suits you own that doesn't mean you have true companionship. We all want a real connection someone to hold us, love us and tell us it will get better. And that transcends age and socio economics. Sometimes people are right on time. No one can go through the world completely alone. We never know what or how long any relationship will last so I suppose the most important thing is to seize the day. Make your own reality and Stella does that with dignity and with pride and admittedly with hesitation and fear. That's the sign of a very real character! Someone who is vulnerable. Someone you can understand even if you're not in the same situation.

So I am going to tell a little story.Me and my best friend are going to live til we are 402 together. We will be sitting in our easy chairs, with our easy walkers in reach, and we will die together. This movie highlights why girls have best friends - and after seeing it, you never want to leave them.It is obviously a chick movie - but its a good one at that. I don't care what it was rated (and I am, a self-proclaimed movie snob) it has wonderful memories.. so girls.. get out there, and rent it with your best friend. You wont regret it.

If you like niche movies, you get three for one here, all bad. It's a black movie. It's a yuppie movie. It's a woman's movie. And it's a bad movie, made worse by the blatant promotion of Jamaica tourism. The story develops with the pace of a geriatric snail. Its premise of a May and December relationship is absurd. The music, of which there is too much, is bland disco noise. Most surprising is that the excellent Whoopi Goldberg plays a minor role. If indeed her career is faltering, this embarrassing turkey won't help it.