Tom, Darcy and their families gather for an ultimate destination wedding on a private island in the Philippines. Just as the couple are away arguing about the wedding, their guests are taken hostage. The pirates demand $45 million dollars from Darcy's wealthy father Robert. He refuses to pay until he is assured that Darcy is alive.
Darcy and Tom are captured apart from the wedding party, but manage to escape their captors, killing one of the pirates. As they try to evade recapture, Darcy and Tom air their respective doubts about the wedding. Cornered hiding in a vault beneath the manager's office, Tom surrenders to them so Darcy can stay hidden.
When he rejoins the rest of the wedding party, Tom reveals that Darcy's ex-fiancé Sean had hired the pirates. With his plot exposed, Sean goes to hunt down Darcy, taking Robert's girlfriend Harriet as a hostage. Meanwhile, Darcy joins Tom and the rest at the pool where she and Tom admit that they still want to marry.
The wedding party members realise that Harriet was in on the plot with Sean. Tom asks the two pirates standing guard to let them complete the wedding ceremony, and Robert says that he will release the money if they let them get married. As the guests sing "I'll Be", Tom and Darcy rush the pirates, and Darcy takes a grenade off one. One pirate surrenders; the other runs, then begins firing on the venue. Tom's mother Carol grabs a weapon from the ground and returns fire. Darcy throws the grenade in the air so Tom can bat it at the pirate, who is killed in the explosion (which also sets off the fireworks that had been staged for the wedding celebration).
As the wedding party goes to safety, Darcy and Tom race to get help, but are confronted on the dock by Sean. Tom fights him, then Tom and Darcy escape in a boat. Harriett tries to stop them in a helicopter. Sean, who had been dragged by a rope with the boat, climbs aboard and fights Tom again while Darcy drives the boat. A parasail is released, taking Tom and Sean into the air. Tom zips down the line to the boat deck. Tom and Darcy cut the line, sending the parasail loose into the helicopter's rotors, which kills both Sean and Harriet. Back on the beach, as authorities take the remaining pirates into custody, Tom and Darcy get married.
On October 27, 2020, Jennifer Lopez was cast as the female lead. Armie Hammer replaced Reynolds (who eventually served as executive producer for the film) as the male lead in the film[4] before dropping out in January 2021 in the wake of abuse allegations against him.[5]
Filming was originally planned to commence in the summer of 2019,[3] but was later rescheduled to February 22, 2021, with shooting taking place in Boston and the Dominican Republic.[9] Lopez announced on Instagram that principal photography had officially wrapped on April 22, 2021.[10]
Release
The film was originally scheduled to be released theatrically by Lionsgate on June 29, 2022.[11] In March 2022, Amazon Studios acquired the rights to the film for a streaming release on Prime Video, released on January 26, 2023. Lionsgate retained international theatrical rights for the film due to US regulations on theatrical policy.[12] It was released in Singapore (via Encore Films),[1] and was released on the streaming service on January 27, 2023.[13]
According to Nielsen Media Research, Amazon Prime Video saw the largest monthly usage increase in January, recording a 9.3% uptick in viewing (+0.2 share pts.) that was driven by its original series, Jack Ryan, and original movie, Shotgun Wedding.[14]
Reception
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 45% of 114 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 5.1/10. The website's consensus reads: "Shotgun Wedding may be just the invitation to escapism that romcom fans and JLo completists are looking for—but most other viewers can safely RSVP no without regrets."[15]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 46 out of 100, based on 28 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.[16]
Box office
Though it wasn't released to theatres in the United States and Canada, Shotgun Wedding was released in international markets, where it grossed $8.3million at the box office.[1]
