For Your Consideration: Temptation (2013)

Everytime, I keep stumbling on random weird movies that Netflix suggests to me, I get excited and put it at the top of my list. And then one of my friend's says, "Hey, did you know Tyler Perry's Temptation" is available for streaming?"

So apologies to 1980s Deathstalker classic , but I can't pass up the opportunity to delve into this. 

Oh, this guy will have his day. I promise.

Before we go on, I'd like to point out that unless you're Tolkien or writing something that's so epic in scale, not to mention good, then you have license to have a long and pointless title. Tyler Perry's Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor does not have any of these factors going for it. Therefore, this movie will simply be known as Temptation.

The story involves a girl named Judith who dreams of being a marriage counselor, yet cheats on her husband with a guy who's claim to fame is being "the third biggest social media inventor since Facebook."

You heard that right. The third biggest since Facebook. So after Twitter, then MySpace, you can find this guy.

We open on a marriage counselor's office, that resembles more of a high school principal or a legal office...

I guess if you want couples to point fingers and hash out their issues, you should make your environment as uncomfortable and sterile as possible.

The counselor starts up the story, "Let me tell you about my sister Judith..." so right away, we're going to be in flashback mode. And immediately, I suspect Judith is the oneactually telling the story.

Soaccording to the flashback narration, Judith and her husband have known each other a long time. They've done lots of things together - like wearing khaki colors and riding buses.

We're told that there's a love for the ages....

They come from humble roots where happiness is in its truest long sleeved form.

According to the flashback, Judith and Brice make the transition from small town to Washington DC where she dreams of being a marriage counselor and he dreams of working in a small privately owned pharmacy.  Which everyone knows that DC is the epicenter for both careers.  He gets what he wants but she has to settle for working for Vanessa Williams, aka The Millionaire Matchmaker (aka NOT Patti Stanger).

Also, its time to talk about Kim Kardashian's acting skills. Not that it deserves to be desconstructed...

"Degrees on the wall aren't worth as much as labels on the back..."

Now say that line with no emotion, possible no understanding of the words and with the most nasal tone possible and now you can experience the Kim Kardashian Thespian Method.

Put them all together in a room, with the third most important social media inventor. Who isn't being tempted?!?!?

Judith comes home to her very loving, very sympathetic, and the man who has known her since she was 12 after three weeks of living here and decides to be dissatisfied.

However, when Social Media Guy tends to a foot injury, temptation starts to happen.

This scene happened when her husband decides to try to romance his wife, naked and with a guitar.

I imagine the flashback narration to the crying couple went like this...

"So, Judith's husband took off his clothes and lip synched to a song.  He put on a cowboy hat and had oiled up his chest to make it more appealing in the dim lighting of their low rent apartment."

We need to address what the husband's been doing during the day. He works at a small pharmacy and despite the fact he's known his wife since he was 11, he has forgotten when her birthday is.

 He wears sweaters and they have one customer...

..who is Brandi and she's hiding a terrible secret. At least that's the conclusion we're told by the way of her wearing hoodies and dispensing wise-beyond-her-years advice.

His boss is a kindly sassy woman who recommends and freely hands out Valium, making her possibly the worst pharmacist ever, but a beloved resource to Washington DC.

Is it enough though? Not when the Third Most Important After Zuckerberg Inventor is taking you on a private jet to New Orleans.

He shoots, he scores.

Know what's awkward? Bringing home your new boyfriend to meet your mom...and your husband.

"After she cheated on her husband, Social Media Inventor took her on a shopping spree, where she carefully picked out an outfit that would impress Kim Kardashian," said the movie's flashback narrator.

"How does this have to do with my husband's inability to listen to me?" Wife Who Needs Counseling.

The real sin with these characters is that no one has the ability to put two and two together.  Judith feels that getting out of her boyfriend's car in front of her house still counts as being covert, while her husband watches and is still surprised when he finds out his wife is cheating on him.

"Judith and the Social Media Inventor of the Ages had sex in a steamy tub with overly loud R&B music that was not added properly during post production," - possible flashback narration dialogue.

During this very ham handed scene, we realize that Judith's boyfriend is actually SATAN (after all, his home is ghoulish and has flames, right?) Someone should probably inform the extras in this scene.

"So Judith was sandwiched in on a tiny couch next to the flames of hell, sucking down some kind of alchohol while a blonde lady looked on...."

Meanwhile, Brice goes to Brandy's apartment and makes his move.  She backs away and says, "I have AIDS."

Nothing will kill the mood more than that statement.

She also informs him that she was with the same Social Media Inventor (aka Satan) and therefore now has AIDS (by the way, SPOILER ALERT). So they do the logical thing....

"Quick! To the Capitol!"

"Or wherever wealthy social media inventors live!"

Brice charges up to him while Satan is sleeping...

...and throws them both out of an indoor window.

And then we switch back to present day, where Wife is left with this reaction.

"And that's why you don't cheat on your husband. Our time is up."

The final scene in this mess of preachy nonsense is our intrepid marriage counselor hobbling to her local pharmacy.

Getting her medication from this familiar face as we discover it was Judith all along.

"Hey there! Here to pick up your AIDS medicine?"

"Have you met my perfect wife and son that I moved on from you with?"

And then Judith walks away and the movie makes us just watch her go as the scene...peters...out.

Overall, some very important lessons were had from watching Tyler Perry's Temptation: Confession of a Local Pharmacist's Wife Who Contracts HIV. I learned that to never forget a spouse's birthday, don't ask Kim Kardashian to talk and whatever you do, don't pick up your prescriptions from your ex-husband that you cheated on.