‘The People We Hate at the Wedding’ revolves around a dysfunctional family who reunites when one of them invites the rest to her wedding. The film is now streaming on Prime Video.
Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers
Plot summary
In the 1980s, Donna married a French man named Henrique in England. Together, they had a girl, Eloise. They split up when Donna caught him sleeping with the babysitter.
Donna returned to her home town, Indianapolis, and married Bill. She had two children with him, Alice and Paul. Eloise would spend half the year with Donna’s new family.
But as the three grew up, they drifted apart. Now, Eloise, who is immensely rich because of Henrique’s fortune, is getting married to Ollie and calls her entire family to London.
Donna contacts Paul and Alice but they’re cold with her as well. Paul believes she moved on too quickly after Bill’s death. Alice has been sleeping with her boss, Jonathan, who is married but keeps assuring her that they will separate.
Paul, on the other hand, is in a relationship with Dominic, who is completely different from him. He keeps suggesting things like open relationships, which Paul isn’t comfortable with at all.
The entire family decides to go to London. Jonathan tells Alice that he won’t be able to join her for the wedding. She meets Dennis on the plane and the two hit it off, and sleep together.
Dominic surprises Paul by cancelling their reservation at the hotel and instead living with an older man named Alcott. His plan is to convince Paul for a threesome with him.
This goes horribly wrong and Paul criticises Dominic for never making him feel enough. He breaks up will Paul to be with Alcott, who turns out to be interested in Paul instead.
Things are going really well between Alice and Dennis, until she gets a message from Jonathan which states that he will be coming to the wedding. Dennis is disappointed and tells her that she wants a man who makes her feel bad.
Eloise tries to mend her relationship with Alice, but the latter is disappointed because she did not come to meet her a year before. Meanwhile, Donna has been getting closer to Henrique again and they sleep together, but the latter is still sleeping with younger women.
At one of the events, Paul tells Eloise that Alice is angry with her because Eloise didn’t show up last year when she had a miscarriage and her boyfriend blamed it on her. Eloise was unaware that they split up because she was being blamed.
When Paul keeps criticising Henrique, Eloise tells him that Bill was actually against him being gay. It was Donna who fought for him and threatened Bill to never make him feel out of place. Paul had been against his mother when she was the one who love him unconditionally.
The People We Hate at the Wedding ending explained in detail:
Why are Donna, Paul and Alice arrested?
Looking at Henrique making out with another woman, Paul gets furious and pees on his boots. Henrique runs after him, and Paul punches him in the face.
Alice realises that the one who had been texting her as Jonathan was actually her wife, Marissa, who starts attacking her. To defend her daughter, Donna gets into the fray and bites her. The three end up in jail together.
They get a message from Eloise, who says that she will stop trying to get closer to them again as they do not want that. And she won’t be bailing them out.
It’s Dennis who ends up bailing out all three. Alice tells him that Jonathan has filed for divorce and wants them to be together now.
Do Donna, Paul and Alice reconcile?
Donna confronts Henrique, who apologises for ruining her life again. But she replies that she ruined his life by being a nice person who actually cared for her, and he has only been filling the hole in his heart after he mess things up with her.
Eloise starts freaking out about her marriage and disappears. Donna, Paul and Alice are leaving the city, but Ollie finds them and asks for help to find her.
They know exactly where she will be; the Taco Bell. Alice decides to talk to her alone. Eloise apologises for not meeting her last year. However, she had a very good reason. She had just found out that she would never be able to bear children. Even Ollie doesn’t know.
Alice apologises for rebuffing Eloise’s attempts to help her get a job in architecture as she always kept her on a pedestal and fell worthless in front of her. They both reconcile and Alice decides to tell Ollie the truth.
Do Alice and Dennis end up together?
All three attend her wedding and walk her down the aisle with Henrique, who tells Donna that whatever she said to him is the truth.
The family finally accepts their mistakes and becomes one. Later, Alice runs into Dennis on the plane and tells him she broke it off with Jonathan. He asks if he could meet her back in the US.
One year later, the family is all together. Eloise and Ollie have adopted a baby. As they are about to click a family picture, Dennis shows up.
He and Alice are now formally together. She finally chose the right person. The narrator states at the end that while it wasn’t a happily ever after, they had been truly reunited.
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