nightlydvdreviewCity Island
June 1st 2010 17:01
The Rizzo's introduce themselves as cinema's new offbeat family
In the tradition of Little Miss Sunshine, comes Raymond De Felitta’s latest indie offering City Island. In this offbeat comedy, Andy Garcia leads a generally endearing cast as the father of yet another dysfunctional American family.
Set in a sleepy town outside of New York, correctional officer Vince Rizzo (Garcia) leads a relatively normal life with his visiting daughter, flippant son and feisty, Bronx-speaking wife Joyce, acted strongly by television’s The Good Wife’s Julianna Margulies. The family’s comfortable existence is threatened though when Vince happens upon his secret long lost son Tony in prison and unwisely brings him home.
This isn’t the only secret Vince keeps. He’s been leaving his family for what he insists are late night poker games, stirring his wife’s suspicion, when in fact he’s attending an acting class. Here, he hopes to fulfil his dream of becoming the next Marlon Brando, aided by Little Miss Sunshine’s Alan Arkin as his acting coach and an irritating Emily Mortimer (Shutter Island) as his acting partner.
The trickery doesn’t end there. His younger son Vinnie is hiding some hefty passions of his own, besotted with his obese neighbour. Vince’s daughter, who is perhaps somewhat eerily acted by Garcia’s real-life daughter Dominik Garcia-Lorido, has been stripping to pay her way back into college after being suspended with the hope of her parents never finding out.
There is nothing particularly inventive about City Island’s screenplay. It fuses the perverse undercurrent of American Beauty with the sweetness of Little Miss Sunshine. Andy Garcia brings a natural charm to his loveable role as the dim witted but well intentioned father, while Emily Mortimer by contrast gives one of the most unmoving and pathetic performances to hit the screen in a long while.
Ultimately, City Island doesn’t take us anywhere new. Raymond De Felitta has however effectively executed the tired concept of family dramas resolved through soppy confessions and there are some good laughs to be had by the heartfelt performances of the Rizzo family.
3 STARS
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