| City Island | |
 In a month studded with blockbusters and big budget actioners, there's a chance that City Island will end up as unknown and unseen as the region of New York that gives the film its name. That would be a crying shame as this low key, amiable comedy packs a rare emotional punch, features some great performances and oozes the spirit of the sort of 1980s indie picture that made me fall in love with cinema in the first place. The real City Island is a mile square piece of New York, located at the northern tip of the Bronx, near Long Island. It's an old fishing community and, while known to Manhattanites as a chi-chi seaside retreat, many of the 5000 people who live there are from families that have been there for generations. This sense of mystery and community makes it the perfect setting for Raymond de Felitta's charming tale of family secrets and lies. If that sounds like a contradiction, or as far away from a comedy as you can get, well, City Island is a film that defies logic in several ways. Vince Rizzo (Garcia) is what locals call a “clam digger”, someone born and raised on the island. He's very much a product of his upbringing and community, a decent, straight-shooting, hard-working family man. However, underneath his corrections officer uniform lurks an unlikely dream: Vince wants to be an actor. Not that he'll admit it to anyone. Indeed, he'd rather let his feisty wife Joyce (Marguiles) believe his weekly poker games are a cover for an affair rather than cover for his acting classes. When Vince's acting coach (Arkin) gives the class an assignment to discuss their biggest secret, Vince finds himself paired off with the enigmatic Molly (Mortimer) and inspired to bring newly released prisoner Tony (Strait) into his home. Tony, you see, is Vince's long lost son from a relationship in his teens - and the child he has never, and still hasn't, admitted to his family. As Tony rapidly discovers, Vince isn't the only Rizzo with a secret. Joyce, seething over Vince's “affair”, is: a) still smoking; and b) attempting to seduce Tony. Vince's daughter Vivian (Garcia's real life daughter Garcia-Lorido) isn't the college student she's pretending to be but a stripper, while youngest son Vinnie Jr (Miller) has a bit of a thing for the larger lady. Even Vince's drama coach and actiing partner turn out to be harbouring secrets and, over the course of the next day or so, all will be revealed. This rapid escalation could be fatal: it would be very easy for City Island to descend, fatally, into a frantic farce. Instead, De Felitta keeps a tight rein yet still allows each character arc and individual story the chance to develop. This makes for some quite delightful moments throughout and makes the ending, the inevitable big reveal, genuinely poignant. Strait, enjoyably bemused by proceedings, is perfect as the story's catalyst, Garcia-Lorido invests real personality in her slightly limiting role and Miller is hugely likeable in the face of his unusual fetish. As for the “names”, Margulies is always great value and she proves here, once again, that someone needs to give her a proper, juicy role. As good as she is though, Garcia just about steals the film and reminds the masses just how good an actor he is. If there is a flaw here it's Emily Mortimer. That's not because of her performance - she's as excellent as she always is - but because Molly's big secret makes her instantly unlikeable: there's eccentric and there's just plain callous. That, however, is the only false note struck by this lovely little film. It's the best of its category since In Search of a Midnight Kiss and I fully expect this to be firmly lodged in my Top Ten for the year come December. Stars: Andy Garcia, Julianna Margulies, Emily Mortimer, Alan Arkin, Steven Strait, Dominik Garcia-Lorido, Ezra Miller Directed by: Raymond De Felitta Written by: Raymond de Felitta Cert 12A, Running time: 103 minutes Rating: **** Neil Davey |
