History Film / AWedding1978

Creator/DennisChristopher and Paul Dooley appear in the film as the bride's brother and father, a year before playing a different father and son in ''Film/BreakingAway.'' Also in the large EnsembleCast are Creator/CarolBurnett (as the bride's mother), Creator/PamDawber (as the groom's equestrian ex-girlfriend), and Creator/GeraldineChaplin (as the wedding planner), among others.

* BottleEpisode: Aside from the opening scene (a church wedding), the entire two-hour movie takes place in the (admittedly large) Corelli mansion and the surrounding grounds.

** The bride still has PubescentBraces and her sister seems to dislike her. Said sister is an ElectiveMute who ReallyGetsAround and has an odd grasp of reality. Her interactions with their HotBlooded father hint at unconsummated ParentalIncest. Their brother initially seems like a drug addict, but actually has epilepsy. Their mother feels tempted to cheat on her husband with one of her new son-in-law's uncles. One of their aunts is a SerialSpouse and her daughter is preoccupied with marijuana. Their uncle and other aunt are a devoutly religious couple who sometimes annoy people and have lots of kids, the eldest of whom mistakes an obvious sex joke about the ManlyGay Reedley looking at mens’ flies for a reference to the film ''Film/TheFly.''

* MarriedToTheJob: Jeff, the security chief, drunkenly admits that he has a self-imposed vow of celibacy to avoid distracting himself from his job.* MassiveNumberedSiblings: Muffin's uncle and his wife have nine kids.

* AmbiguousDisorder: Muffin's sister Buffy rarely talks, often puts her hands against her ears, splashes water at her own reflection, has difficulty counting, and strips down in public to stand in front of a nude painting of her sister.

* GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion: Zigzagged. [[spoiler:When it turns out that Buffy is pregnant, most of her family besides Reverend Rutledge and his wife want her to have an abortion. However, Dr. Meecham says that she's too far along in the pregnancy for an abortion to be safe. Additionally, the need for an abortion becomes less urgent when it turns out that Dino the groom probably isn't the baby's father after all. Buffy's AmbiguousDisorder makes it unclear what she thinks of the whole thing.]]

* TheFundamentalist: Downplayed with Reverend David Rutledge and his wife Clarice, who are generally friendly, well-meaning and unobtrusive but sometimes annoy or unsettle people while discussing their beliefs. David believes that God talked to him and told him to abandon his life as a FormerTeenRebel about eighteen years earlier, and views dancing and drinking as sinful. His wife Clarice frustrates Tulip by talking about how much marriage vows mean and how GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion when [[spoiler:it seems as if Dino has impregnated Buffy.]]

* MassiveNumberedSiblings: Muffin's uncle and his wife have nine kids.

* AdaptationDistillation: Dozens of characters and subplots get cut out of the opera version to make time for the songs. [[CompositeCharacter Mac is combined with Dr. Meecham and Reedley is combined with Wilson.]]

* PetTheDog: Dr. Meachum is a handsy, hard-drinking heroin peddler who has little patience for people who disagree with him and tacitly acknowledges that he's less moral than the average doctor, but he can be considerate toward others. He doesn't want Nettie's death to ruin her grandson's wedding. He isn't opposed to performing abortions but won't do it when it would endanger the mother's life. He also [[spoiler:reminds Luigi that Nettie is dead and can't control his life anyone to defuse a fight between Luigi and his brother after Nettie forbid Luigi's brother from visiting.]]

* MrViceGuy: Dr. Meachum is a handsy, hard-drinking heroin peddler who has little patience for people who disagree with him and tacitly acknowledges that he's less moral than the average doctor, but he can be considerate toward others. He doesn't want Nettie's death to ruin her grandson's wedding. He isn't opposed to performing abortions but won't do it when it would endanger the mother's life. He also [[spoiler:reminds Luigi that Nettie is dead and can't control his life anyone to defuse a fight between Luigi and his brother after Nettie forbid Luigi's brother from visiting.]]

** The groom was previously sent to military school for delinquency and once had a fling with his new fiancée's sister. The groom's dying grandmother Nettie Sloan has shades of an EvilMatriarch despite some PetTheDog moments. One of her daughters is a sometimes superficial executive whose husband has fallen out of love with her, another is in love with their African-American butler and resents Nettie for forbidding the match, and the third daughter is a heroin addict. Her other son-in-law is an Italian former busboy who Nettie snobbishly forbids from talking about his past, with his secrecy making many people mistake him for a mobster. His brother shows up at the wedding without an invitation and has a raging libido. Nettie's sister is a socialist and has no sense of tact or grace. Nettie's granddaughter and grandniece seem well-adjusted, but the former seems to resent her new sister-in-law and the later has a stash of marijuana.

* {{Jerkass}}: Muffin's father Snooks is implied to lust after his younger daughter Buffy, but then [[spoiler:considers her DefiledForever after she sleeps with several boys from the MilitarySchool.]] He is also extremely rude to his wife and shows some SkewedPriorities by bringing up how much he paid for the wedding when [[spoiler:everyone thinks Muffin and Dino are dead]].

* FormerTeenRebel: Muffin's uncle is a polite [[TheTeetotaler teetotaler]], minister, and father of nine. He freely admits that his youth was full of drinking, troublemaking and womanizing [[BabiesMakeEverythingBetter until he got his future wife pregnant.]]

* MrViceGuy: Dr. Meachum is a hard-drinking heroin peddler who has little patience for people who disagree with him and tacitly acknowledges that he's less moral than the average doctor, but he can be considerate toward others. He doesn't want Nettie's death to ruin her grandson's wedding. He isn't opposed to performing abortions but won't do it when it would endanger the mother's life. He also [[spoiler:reminds Luigi that Nettie is dead and can't control his life anyone to defuse a fight between Luigi and his brother after Nettie forbid Luigi's brother from visiting.]]

* MrViceGuy: Dr. Meachum is a hard-drinking heroin peddler who has little patience for people who disagree with him and tacitly acknowledges that he's less moral than the average doctor, but he can be considerate toward others. He doesn't want Nettie's death to ruin her grandson's wedding. He isn't opposed to performing abortions but won't do it when it would endanger the mother's life. He also [[spoiler:tells Luigi that Nettie is dead and can't control his life anyone to defuse a fight between Luigi and his brother after Nettie forbid Luigi's brother from visiting.]]

** The groom was previously sent to military school for delinquency and once had a fling with his new fiancée's sister. The groom's dying grandmother Nettie Sloan has shades of an EvilMatriarch. One of her daughters is a sometimes superficial executive whose husband has fallen out of love with her, another is in love with their African-American butler and resents Nettie for forbidding the match, and the third daughter is a heroin addict. Her other son-in-law is an Italian former busboy who Nettie snobbishly forbids from talking about his past, with his secrecy making many people mistake him for a mobster. His brother shows up at the wedding without an invitation and has a raging libido. Nettie's sister is a socialist and has no sense of tact or grace. Nettie's granddaughter and grandniece seem well-adjusted, but the former seems to resent her new sister-in-law and the later has a stash of marijuana.