Happy Birthday to
Andy Garcia
55 today
Andy (birth name Andrés Arturo García Menéndez) didn't really register in New York I Love You even though I'd been looking forward to it for months. His role was in the first section and I felt the short was too tricksy to really work. It's a shame because I always want to like to watch him, but so few of his performances come my way.
Showing posts with label Andy Garcia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Andy Garcia. Show all posts
Tuesday, 12 April 2011
Andy Garcia
Thursday, 3 March 2011
New York, I Love You
2009. Dir: Various. Starring: Natalie Portman, Ethan Hawke, Chris Cooper, Cloris Leachman and Julie Christie. ●●●○○
It's difficult to review a collection of shorts like New York, I Love You, do you review each of the shorts as individual pieces, or try to assess the whole collection as a single entity? Luckily we have a template as this is a follow up to the critically acclaimed 2006 film Paris, Je T'Aime which presented a number of Gallic themed romances. Unfortunately New York doesn't live up to the high standards of his European predecessor.
The premise is relatively simple, 10 renowned directors (including Mira Nair and Brett Ratner) take a geographical area of the Big Apple and portray a love affair which somehow encapsulates the feel and atmosphere of the region whilst being linked by a mysterious French girl filming segments of life with her video camera. One of the main issues of the project is that none of the films seems to be uniquely presenting a way of life in the city, they're all stories that could easily be transplanted to an alternative zip code.
Three of the shorts stood out of the pack as worth watching.
Mira Nair is an old hand at the short film format, having worked on 8 and the 9/11 memorial collection. Here the chaste romance between Hasidic bride to be Natalie Portman and Jain divorcee Irfan Khan as they barter over diamond prices, cleverly highlighting the differences and ties between them over their irreconcilable faiths is fascinating and beautifully played.
Ethan Hawke, Maggie Q, Chris Cooper and Robin Wright have two very different conversations about hooking up with strangers in the city, with pull the rug under our feet consequences (alas the first meeting was rather ruined in the trailer) which blindside the audience in a surprising yet shocking way, and both involve the female taking charge of the sexual nature of their conversations reversing the usual gender expectations. Yvan Attal takes a lo-fi hand held approach to the direction allowing the actors room to breathe. Hawke himself probably takes the performance crown for the piece for this section and for his delightfully funny miming in the linking segments.
The final section, and the only one with a real sense of place, is Joshua Marston's Coney Island set two hander with Eli Wallach and Cloris Leachman alternatively hilariously bickering and touchingly quiet as they walk to the seafront. The dialogue between them clearly illustrates the nature of their relationship and the underlying love between them. It's one of the few scenes that offers contrast and a lightness of touch missing from most of the other films.
Other scenes, such as the ponderous Shekhar Kapur segment (wasting John Hurt and Julie Christie) and the overtricksy opener with Andy Garcia and Hayden Christiansen (directed by Jiang Wen), are best avoided but as with all collections there's an unfortunate inconsistency in quality which combined with the drabness of the collection makes this tough to recommend.
Hopefully by the time we get to Shanghai, I love you some of those issues will be resolved.
Friday, 23 July 2010
You're - still - a toy! (Out this week - 23/07/2010)
Pixar do it again, the annual tradition of opening a movie to critical acclaim and box-office domination continues for another year. You have to wonder what they put on their cornflakes. It's quite a good week for counter-programming too with three other films that could have sneaked a film of the week mention if it wasn't so competitive. Nevertheless the crown inevitably goes to Toy Story 3.
Baaria
Golden Globe nominated Italian film following generations of a Sicilian family through births, marriages and deaths, through the rise and fall of Fascism the mob and the communist party, and all via the eyes of a Shepherd's Son.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●○○○○○○○
City Island
Andy Garcia wants to be an actor - it's a little late for that I hear you say - but no jokes his character wants to leave the nine to five and tread the boards in this New York serio-comedy. Also starring Julianna Margulies as his suspicious wife and Alan Arkin as his acting coach.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●○○○○○○
Ivul
Bizarre looking French fable about a boy who exiles himself following a brush with incest. Avant-garde touches make this inaccessible to most of the cinema-going crowd.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●○○○○○○○○
Jaspar, Penguin Explorer
Pleasant untesting animation aimed at the very young. Originally in German the trailer makes Pingu look like Bertrand Russell. See it if you dare.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●○○○○○○○
Khatta Meetha
Bollywood expose uncovering the corruption and brutality in the road building industry (no, really). The ubiquitous Akshay Kumar stars.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●○○○○○○○○
Rebound
Catherine Zeta-Jones happily pigeonholes herself as a cougar (no doubt proving her acting worth) by going for a much younger man in Nanny Justin Bartha. They make a cute couple in the trailer.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●○○○○○○
Splice
Vincenzo Natali latest sci-fi offering melds creature feature prosphetics with modern ethical dilemmas as married biologists Adrian Brody and Sarah Polley make a 'baby'.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●●○○○○○
Thillalangadi
The trailer has it all, comic sidekicks, easy to copy dance routines and kick-ass car chases. Nothing that could pass for a plot though.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●○○○○○○○○
Toy Story 3
The Toy Story movies are now receiving accolades as the best film trilogy of all time now that the third feature has kept the ball in the air. Expect Tom Hanks and Tim Allen as Woody and Buzz to remain centre stage but with hilarious new characters voiced by Michael Keaton, Ned Beatty and Timothy Dalton to stealing some scenes. Female toys include Joan Cusack and Whoopi Goldberg.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●●●●○○○
Sunday, 12 April 2009
Andy Garcia
Happy Birthday to
Andy Garcia
53 today
Garcia began acting in films in the early 80s but it wasn't until The Untouchables in 1987 that people began to take notice of his talent. Three years later, in the ill judged third installment of the Godfather films, Garcia stole the films from the likes of Al Pacino and Diane Keaton. Since then he's not managed to get the roles his talent deserves, although I am looking forward to seeing him in New York, I Love You.
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