If you’re getting married over the summer, best avoid this documentary about weddings and marriage. Don’t get me wrong: it’s often lovely and sometimes very funny; but you might find it terrifying. It’s by doc-maker Doug Block, who for 20 years has been filming wedding videos (112 of them) to make a bit of cash on the side. Now he’s gone back to interview nine of his favourite couples. There must be something about his gentle, hippie-shrink manner, but these people spill their guts: affairs, children with life-threatening illnesses, you name it.
The scary part about ‘112 Weddings’ is not even the divorced couples (because that’s never going to happen to you, right?) – but the still-married, happy but stressed ones talking honestly. Here’s one new dad on the stress of having a baby: ‘The first nine months were like minute-by-minute torture.’ Last word goes to the director’s rabbi friend: ‘The wedding is the easiest day to make happy. You’ve just thrown a ton of money and liquor at it. Marriage is harder. When you throw money and liquor at it, it makes it worse.’ You’ve been warned.