'Steel Magnolias' review: Lifetime remake

Banter gives way to panic within minutes: Shelby, who is diabetic, goes into insulin shock, but she quickly recovers when she drinks a glass of orange juice. Harling's play was based on a tragedy in his own family, the death of his sister.

His adaptation is largely faithful, with some of the dialogue updated, along with the hairstyles. Shelby still says she'd rather have "30 minutes of something wonderful than a lifetime of nothing special." The ending has been dramatically altered, but the outcome remains the same. Tears, in other words, flow.

The racial component, meanwhile, is irrelevant except in one key respect: Harling's story of life's sweet moments bound to tragic ones has nothing to do with the color of one's skin, which is probably the point he wanted to make here. If so, great point, but the film still feels too often humorless, at times leaden, while the casting decisions are perplexing. Why not have Phylicia Rashad play M'Lynn, as mother to her real-life daughter? Latifah here is more like a big sister.

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