Crossing Delancey.

Review #2521: Crossing Delancey.

Cast: 

Amy Irving (Isabelle Grossman), Peter Riegert (Sam Posner), Reizl Bozyk (Bubbe "Ida" Kantor), Jeroen Krabbé (Anton Maes), Sylvia Miles (Hannah Mandelbaum), George Martin (Lionel), John Bedford Lloyd (Nick), Claudia Silver (Cecelia Monk), David Hyde Pierce (Mark), Rosemary Harris (Pauline Swift), Suzzy Roche (Marilyn Cohen), Amy Wright (Ricki), and Faye Grant (Candyce) Directed by Joan Micklin Silver (#1818 - Hester Street, #1988 - Between the Lines, #2193 - Chilly Scenes of Winter)

Review: 

“The more I’m left alone, the better I do. It isn’t that I think I’m smarter than anyone or anything like that. It’s just what whatever my instincts are, it’s better for me to be able to put those into play in my own work.”

You might call this a slam-dunk type of movie to go with, if you like the previous efforts of Joan Micklin Silver. Sure, Chilly Scenes of Winter (1979) was butchered by the studio to where it didn't even have the title it wanted until a 1982 re-edit, but she had kept busy in the meantime, doing a handful of TV movies (How to Be a Perfect Person in Just Three Days and Finnegan Begin Again) along with Off-Broadway productions. Silver first heard of the Crossing Delancey play from Susan Sandler, as it started out as a five-person play that Sandler wanted Silver to see and it soon raised her interest to do a film, although there was little interest in making the film due to it apparently being "too ethnic". Steven Spielberg, who was married to Irving at the time, helped get the film to the attention of Warner Bros. and an executive willing to do the movie with Silver. Made on a budget of roughly $4 million, the movie (one where she had final cut privilege, a thing she stated was her favorite part of the experience of making the film) was a light hit with audiences. Silver made three further theatrical films, with the next being Loverboy (1989)

Whether one has heard or experienced the qualms of someone trying to play matchmaker or not, we've all had that experience of trying to figure of what we really want. Basically, it is a movie about someone who has to figure out what they really want from their life, one that is wrapped within the city life of New York and a proud Jewish rom-com identity that unwinds its 97 minute runtime to justify its love story with such charm and the knowledge to just let the story breathe in the feminine perspective. It helps that the movie has plenty of good timing with humor in the variety of characters that come through the Lower East Side (single or otherwise), honestly. There is a tension of trying to figure things out as a "modern girl" that Irving handles with such entertaining grace, mainly because she lays out what she thinks she wants with the right type of timing for a wavering mood. She sees the life (possibly non-Jewish, if you read into that) inhabited by folks such as Krabbe and thinks that is the one she wants to orbit around no matter how much you could see through him quickly (that's not to criticize Krabbe, because he is quite funny here). Incidentally, the one thing that Sandler requested for the film was that it include Peter Riegert (you might remember was in Silver's previous film with Chilly Scenes of Winter). It's easy to see why Riegert* being here is a pretty good choice when you consider the fact that he makes such a warm presence to contribute to such a curious chemistry with Irving, mainly because he plays blue-collar elegance with the type of confidence of who they are and what they like. This was the only film appearance of Reizl Bozyk, the Polish-born actress who had been involved with Yiddish stage from her youth (right up to her death in 1993 at the age of 79, she was set to tour again for Crossing Delancey on stage), and she practically comes off as a pro with how amusing and delightful she proves to those who, well, know about well-meaning old folks. The others are also pretty fascinating, mainly with the amusingly pushy Miles or the one-scene charmer with Harris. Basically, this is a movie for people who need a film to pair with Marty (1955) in terms of exploring what really matters in trying to be happy with another person and actually crossing the path to get there. Is it predictable and schmaltzy? Perhaps, but that's the whole fun of it all, because it is a movie that sees the clash of "modern" sensibilities and ones of tradition and finds hope that they can in fact co-exist hand-in-hand for a winner.

Overall, I give it 9 out of 10 stars.

(belated) Song of the day

*Riegert was in Animal House and The Mask, hell yeah

Chilly Scenes of Winter.

Review #2193: Chilly Scenes of Winter.

Cast: 

John Heard (Charles Richardson), Mary Beth Hurt (Laura Connelly), Peter Riegert (Sam), Kenneth McMillan (Pete), Gloria Grahame (Clara), Nora Heflin (Betty), Jerry Hardin (Patterson), Tarah Nutter (Susan Richardson), Mark Metcalf (Jim Connelly), and Griffin Dunne (Mark) Written and Directed by Joan Micklin Silver (#1818 - Hester Street and #1988 - Between the Lines)

Review: 

 ''I was determined not to violate the book, which I loved. I wanted the general action to be the same, but my ending was too triumphant. People in the crew kept coming up to me when we were shooting and telling me, 'This is the story of my life.' But when I asked them if it turned out like it did in the movie, they would always admit that it hadn't.''

In 1976, a novel called Chilly Scenes of Winter by Ann Beattie was released into stores, with her having been a regular author in The New Yorker. Three actors in Mark Metcalf, Amy Robinson, and Griffin Dunne were interested to produce the book as a film by purchasing the film rights (after a whole bunch of studios rejected it), much to the interest of Joan Micklin Silver (who read some of Beattie's stories) and liked the book. Claire Townsend liked it when she worked at Fox and when she moved to United Artists to be a production executive, she eventually got them to finance the project and also eventually get the idea of Silver to be the one to direct (the group had liked her anyway). The group stayed with their favoring of John Heard to play the read (rather than cast someone like John Ritter as favored by UA) while going with Mary Beth Hurt to act opposite him when Meryl Streep apparently wanted...Sam Waterston to play opposite her. It was United Artists who botched the film when it came for original release in 1979 that had the title of "Head over Heels" because they thought it was a more viable title, with the Heels title coming around as a joke suggestion when UA wouldn't go with the original book title because of some sort of perception that "Chilly" and "Winter" wouldn't sell well as a title. The ending of the film and the one you see now are different in the inclusion of one more thing, namely the idea of a romance that isn't as over as it seems, which actually matched the novel but was not what Silver had in mind. Silver wrote the film herself after approaching Beattie and getting a no (Beattie instead wanted a small part in the film, which ended up with her playing a waitress with no lines). In 1982, United Artists Classics approached her about re-releasing it under the aforementioned Winter title, complete with keeping the ending she had envisioned (which instead of ending with our lead coming home after a jog to a woman is instead one where it just ends on him immediately after the jog). That version had a decidedly less chilly reception to where there is one of those arguments for calling it a "cult classic" (if one is in the Criterion market, look no further?). Amidst of a handful of television films, Silver's next film as a feature director wasn't until 1988's Crossing Delancey.

Well, it is an anatomy of a chilled romance (being set and mostly filmed in Salt Lake City, no less), so I do wonder what exactly UA thought they were going to get by playing it light? It is a crashing, uneasy sense of comedy-drama that isn't the easiest sell but works just right for 92 minutes. Really you could interpret the film as belonging to the fallacies that come in relationships of the heart and with friends, specifically the one where people really can be their own worst enemy. Consider that this is the kind of movie that has someone make someone go to a skin flick and then have a thing about someone seemingly exalting them. Heartbreak happens, but life goes on, regardless of much it stings (such as, say, a friend who betrayed them or, well, losing a love). Wrapped within a melancholic movie that basically harkens to a noir within its first batch of lines of a man wrapped in what he wants (but doesn't have), is the note that comes in clearly at the end: people are a series of contradictions and opportunities that either never came or skipped them by. It is an endearing movie for all of the failures that happen in life. Seeing it now, it seems totally right that Silver had Heard pegged for this role right then and there, because he really does make this role one to look upon not with judgement or outright sympathy but with curiosity. There is something fascinating in seeing that all-consuming energy come into focus with all of the hang-ups and eccentricities that Heard makes in this tightrope-type of act here. It could've easily just been a film about a guy who simply gets a bit weird about a woman for it to go right in the end or just a straight stalker movie but Heard makes it fit right square in the middle in that amusing anatomy of a fall. Hurt makes that idea of chemistry between people who simply have different ideas in mind of who they are to others. Being trapped between the idea of someone who doesn't seem that particularly interesting to them and the other choice of "obsession in the form of a six-pack". One sees her as a puzzle piece that isn't one to easily peg down beyond first appearances, because nobody is that easy to see through or figure out as if they were an object to chase. That scene they share in which they discuss the ideas of boundaries that goes from playful to eye-raising (whether taken literally or not) is pretty much the whole film served on a platter with how they handle it. Roles like this do make me wonder if I should see more movies that have Riegert in them, because even a role where he is just a playful pal that in one scene moves along with a ploy with Heard to just go with playing a prospective couple looking around just so they can "stumble" upon a certain woman through a salesman. Grahame gets to strut in the eyes of mental feebleness for an interesting act to see with Heard. As a whole, it is a wonderful thing to see this film in the way that Silver and company envisioned play out for people to seek out rather than wonder what could have been because of how delightfully uncomfortable it is. It walks that fine line of comedy and drama for a pretty good effort in human frailitiy. 

Overall, I give it 9 out of 10 stars.

Between the Lines.

Review #1988: Between the Lines.

Cast: 

John Heard (Harry Lucas), Lindsay Crouse (Abbie), Jeff Goldblum (Max Arloft), Jill Eikenberry (Lynn), Bruno Kirby (David Entwhistle), Gwen Welles (Laura), Stephen Collins (Michael), Lewis J. Stadlen (Stanley), Jon Korkes (Frank), Michael J. Pollard (The Hawker), Lane Smith (Roy Walsh), Joe Morton (Ahmed), and Marilu Henner (Danielle) Directed by Joan Micklin Silver (#1818 - Hester Street)

Review: 

Admittedly, if you want to follow up a sleeper hit that was thought to be too "ethnic" from big studios, I suppose an ensemble piece with up-and-coming actors is not the oddest thing to come up with. As with her last effort in Hester Street (1975), Raphael D. Silver served as producer. The film was written by Fred Barron and David M. Helpern Jr. Barron had written for the Boston Phoenix, an alternative weekly periodical and he used his experiences there to help shape the script (incidentally, Silver had worked for the Village Voice before becoming a director. This was the second of a total of seven theatrical films that Silver directed. The cast might be the most standout quality in terms of the sheer rise that came from some of them: this was the debut for Heard, Eikenberry, and Morton, who each had started in stage and television before this film, while Goldblum had made his debut in film only three years prior while Crouse was fresh off supporting roles in All the President's Men (1976) and Slap Shot (1977). Perhaps fitting the tone of the film is the inclusion of Welles, who earlier had a supporting role in Nashville (1976). The film was shot and set in Boston.

The movie has a picturesque style of trying to show a look at a time that was within a bare plot composed of episodic pace and an attempt at forming an interesting ensemble. I just wish it was a better movie to sit through for 101 minutes, because it is an experience that seems hopelessly stuck between wistful reminiscences of a time long ago and mildly interesting humor without ever sticking to one main plot. It lingers in episodic format without making a stand for itself beyond trying to ride with mildly likeable people (except for one glaring case) that has a last act that feels like it should have been firmly in the middle. Look, you don't need much to go on about the dangers of big business in little papers, but the bare minimum is meant to be doubly excelled, not barely cleared. Heard makes for a mostly capable lead in frustration and drive. His on-again, off-again dynamic with Crouse is at least entertaining to try and hold a film longer than the other ideas presented, if only because one would like to see more when presented with someone loaded in talent that could use her as just an excuse to not write. You can already see how Goldblum became a curious presence in film here, since he practically gobbles the attention right out from under folks, one that sees him act like a flake in mostly satisfying ways that might as well be a predecessor to his role in The Big Chill (1983); I especially like a scene where he talks with a performance artist with accompanying acts of "art". Kirby makes a suitable middleman in terms of wistful charm in the foreground. Korkes makes an okay beleaguered head to the process. It should only figure the one actor who is the most loathsome in terms of who they became in later life has the least interesting performance. Collins is simply not fun to watch, seemingly trying to bring humor in self-involved author crap that is bland and easily skippable when contrasted with literally anyone on screen. Whether intended as a caricature of writers who want to write the "great American novel" or not, he doesn't do anything worth mentioning positively. Hell, Pollard is playing a cliche with the newspaper salesman on the street, and he runs circles around him when it comes to general charm because one finds Pollard endearing in the foreground and background in those moments, while Stadlen is at least meant to be a foil in his advertising shill persona. Smith only shows up in the last couple of scenes as the prospective buyer of the news station that clearly means big changes...and since the movie ends quickly after that, his impact is diminished despite the fact that he makes an imposing figure. I mean, sure, make an argument all you want about the creeping danger of big business onto papers that supposedly tap into the city, but don't just latch it in late (putting "rumors of a big buy" through the film doesn't cut it). The presentation of contrasts between Heard-Crouse and Collins-Welles would be interesting if the latter didn't end with a completely lame resolution to the latter that is less a case of "human decision-making" and more just a lazy way to throw things together. As a whole, what I like about the movie is the occasional amusing moments that come within trying to make a living in newspapers with a place now resigned to being a middle-ground on the way up or down for people, one that has some ideas wishing to flow for a stronger experience. The loss of innocence within a newspaper that sees its ambition squashed would make an intriguing tragedy, but here one finds a movie that can barely hold the jockstrap of Park Row (1952) It might be an interesting time capsule for a time long past in terms of newspaper media being more than just the option used for people who don't like reading a phone screen, and that is probably the best compliment one could make. 

Overall, I give it 7 out of 10 stars.

Next Time: Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962)

Hester Street.

Review #1818: Hester Street.

Cast: 

Steven Keats (Jake), Carol Kane (Gitl), Mel Howard (Bernstein), Dorrie Kavanaugh (Mamie), Doris Roberts (Mrs. Kavarsky), and Lauren Friedman (Fanny) Written and Directed by Joan Micklin Silver.

Review: 

"I came of age for film, at a time when the sexism was pretty strong. And although I could get work as a Writer, I couldn’t get work as a Director at all. And I had the experience of watching young men who had made shorts as I had, prize winning shorts, as I had, moving on to directing films and I couldn’t do it. And, and my husband, Ray, was… became angry, and he said, “You know, maybe you can do it, maybe you can’t, but everybody should have a chance to try for the brass ring.”

Joan Micklin Silver was born in Omaha, Nebraska in in 1935 to a family of Russian Jewish immigrants. In that sense, it only seems fitting that her first film would be one like this. She had graduated from Sarah Lawrence College before moving to Cleveland with her husband to teach music and write for the next eleven years. She continued her writing when she moved to New York City in 1967, where she would write for The Village Voice. She soon wrote scripts for educational films and found her way into directing within that area, which resulted in three works, most notably with "The Immigrant Experience", a short about Polish immigrants. Silver would end up directing for until 2003 with a handful of theatrical features (seven) and television work, with this and Crossing Delancey (1988) being her highlights (with each touching upon Jewish identity). The movie is an adaptation of the 1896 novella Yekl: A Tale of the New York Ghetto by Abraham Cahan; he was born in Lithuania before immigrating to New York City at the age of 21 that was part of the exodus of Jewish peoples from Eastern and Southern Europe to the States (roughly 2.8 million), and he is mostly known for his work within Yiddish language newspapers. A 19th century tale about Jewish people trying to assimilate in a newly adopted country for the 20th century surely would attract studio attention...it did not. A first-time director, particularly a woman, was felt to be "another problem" that studios did not want to fund; making independent movies had changed from decade to decade, but that didn't mean things would be easy, especially with a film with a handful of dialogue communicated in Yiddish with substitute. The film was funded by Raphael Silver, a real estate developer who saw his wife's trouble with getting a studio to produce the film and decided to pull roughly over $300,000 together to do it, complete with filming in New York (Hester Street, while located in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, was not used for filming). Distribution struggles ended with a run on the festival circuit that turned into a fair audience hit. 

I'm sure you are familiar with films made as a passion project. Of course, certain movies made in the memory of others didn't have to deal with funding difficulties or being thought of as too "ethnic". For what Silver wanted to achieve in making a tale involving the clash of traditionalism versus assimilation, I would say that the movie is a fair success, one that doesn't serving as a judging ground for what kind of life seems best. With its black-and-white photography, one gets the feeling of watching an old photograph that seems aptly appropriate for the film, which utilizes limited settings to show the assimilation from each angle to useful effect, which naturally ends with one famed custom in the religion: A get (divorce), which is done tastefully. This would end up one of Kane's first shining roles, and it earned her an Academy Award nomination (losing to Louise Fletcher is not a shame). At any point, when she does finally arrive on screen, she makes the most of it with earthy patience. It doesn't require great monologues to see a performance built on observation and immense struggle for charm. Keats proves suitable as the other side of assimilation, in the classic hustling sense. There is a man in there, it just happens to have a bit of ooze for a few amusing moments when it comes to seeing just what one would do to be thought of as something else besides what they are, whether that involves cheating on women or trying to change a name. Howard patiently makes his mark in dutiful patience, while Kavanaugh pairs well with Keats. Roberts proves sound with careful charm that serves as a helping hand to Kane. The movie does fair in showing a way of life in its drama without hesitation or melodrama that makes a useful 90-minute curiosity. For the independent circuit, this is a movie that I would recommend for what Silver managed to do with a tale that will prove rewarding in interest for its audience without compromises.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.

Next Time: The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter (1980).