Review: Romance and Cigarettes (2007) *** 1/2
Susan Sarandon gives it her all in Romance and Cigarettes
If The Honeymooners‘ Ralph and Alice Kramden broke into pop songs to articulate feelings beyond their working class grasp of language, the result might be something like John Turturro’s Romance and Cigarettes. It’s got a certain shaggy quality to it, a little like a drunken night at a karaoke bar. As such it’s a bit of a mess, but you have to admire the fearlessness of the act. If you don’t, maybe you just need another Jack and Coke.
Nick (James Gandolfini) is an iron worker living in a blue collar neighborhood in New York. When his seamstress wife Kitty (Susan Sarandon) discovers a note to a mistress in his pants pocket, 30 odd years of pent up marital rage flow out as the characters sing along to popular songs ranging from Engelbert Humperdink’s A Man Without Love to Bruce Springsteen’s Red Headed Woman. It sounds fruity and it is, but damnit it won me over.
Where else are you going to find Susan Sarandon singing along passionately to Piece of My Heart? I’m not sure which version it was…it sounded like Dusty Springfield and Janis Joplin jumbled together, but don’t quote me on that. It turns out Ms. Sarandon was not using her own voice, but it was still a lot of fun. It’s nice to see one of our best actresses unafraid of looking foolish, letting her hair down and giving her all to a bit of craziness in a movie that most people will probably never see. This is not a career move. This is a woman pushing the boundaries at a point in her career when she need prove nothing. What’s more, she nails it.
Then there is Kate Winslet as sultry Tula, the woman who causes Nick’s eye to wander. She’s a trampy, fast-talking, foul mouthed English tart who works in a lingerie shop selling “dirty knickers”. Tula is full of crude, sexy energy and when she’s not talking a filthy blue streak, she gets a couple of great numbers including Connie Francis’ Scapricciatiello (Do You Love Me Like You Kiss Me). It isn’t a Grammy winning performance, but it’s funny and it’s certainly something to see, especially if you love Kate Winslet. If you don’t, well I’m not sure we can stay friends.
Rounding out the cast are Steve Buscemi, Mandy Moore, Bobby Cannavale, Mary-Louise Parker, Eddie Izzard. Perhaps best of all is a freaked out Christopher Walken as Kitty’s Elvis Presley loving cousin Bo. With a ’50s sense of fashion and hair that defies gravity, he shows up to help Kitty track the strumpet Tula down. He gets an extended dance number set to Tom Jones’ Delilah that might just be worth the price of a ticket all by itself. Walken is perfect for this kind of thing. He’s fearless and he’s got that dangerous twinkle in his eye that dares you to make fun of him.
As Joe Baltake notes in a recent post at the passionate moviegoer, “the more popular and enduring film musicals of the past 40 or so years have been tied to music, embracing plots that give their characters a legitimate reason to sing both on stage and off.” Modern audiences are no longer attuned to seeing characters break into song for no reason. There are films that buck this trend, but Baltake singles out this year’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street as a rare modern example of a film musical with the nerve to have characters sing without a performance based context. I’d add Romance and Cigarettes to the list. These characters aren’t performers, they’re regular people and their singing is simply an expression of feeling. What’s more, with the exceptions of Moore and Walken (who got his start in musical theater), these aren’t trained singers. They make up for it however with energy and their performances have an endearing singing-along-to-the-car-radio quality to them.
I know this all sounds like a potential train wreck and it’s true that many of you are probably going to hate it, but if you can set aside your cynicism and preconceptions for a couple of hours and just appreciate the gusto of the performances, you will be rewarded. If nothing else, it’s a bunch of top-shelf actors, completely deglamourized and exposed, giving it their all. No punches are pulled and the result is messy, silly, and crude, but it’s also an honest, unique and oddly entertaining little valentine to the ups and downs of love.
Romance and Cigarettes was actually completed in 2005 and it very nearly went direct to DVD, but it’s been self-released by Mr. Turturro and has been making its way around the country since November. You can see a list of play dates at the official Romance and Cigarettes website.
Romance and Cigarettes. USA 2005 (US release 2007). Written and directed by John Turturro. Starring James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon, Kate Winslet, Steve Buscemi, Bobby Cannavale, Mandy Moore, Mary-Louise Parker, Aida Turturro, Christopher Walken and Eddie Izzard. 1 hour 45 minutes. MPAA Rating: R for sexual content including some strong dialogue, and language. 3.5 stars (out of 5)
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the cynic…yeah me…..says….uh the preview/trailer thing i saw looked pretty tasty. but i’m not sure if i can brave it(read that as try in my current very blah mental state)
and and i hate singing too…..
unless the singers can’t sing sing a do interesting things with their ‘limited’ vocal ablity. things that grammy winners would never try…things that people than ‘can sing’ will never try….
Brighten up glim! Otherwise, you’ll have to substitute the “l” with an “r”. And we like it better when you shine.
Try and always look on the light side of life my friend.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCWw6W5NEa8
I love that scene.
Fine review Craig. I particularly liked the karaoke bar evocation. I admire how you’re making a case for the gutsiness and gusto of the performances and the film’s ambition. But I’m not big on musicals - with or without Kate W - and will save this one for the DVD queue. The one musical I’ll see on the big screen this year (tonight in fact) will for obvious reasons be Sweeney.
Thank you Sartre, I’m not recommending everyone run out and see this one for obvious reasons, but I think a certain kind of viewer will dig it.
sartre,thanks but you know i don’t even have pc speakers. a certain kind of luck….
http://www.petitiononline.com/larsnet/petition.html
Apparently it played here on 12/14 for a week and I missed it. Huh. Oh well…DVD here we come.
Saw Sweeney last night. I was entertained but under-whelmed. It didn’t help that I’m no fan of the “operetta” style of music. I thought Johnny did all that was asked of him but I’m not sure that the role gave him much to show off his talent with. The character is pretty much one-note. And any film that packs in so much singing simply doesn’t have room to offer a story with depth and more nuanced characters. In terms of direction I found it accomplished but nothing special. Sorry to be such a sourpuss. It’s a fine film but not one I’d place in my top ten of ‘07. My favorite passages featured Sasha Baron Cohen. The film might have worked better for me if its overall tone was more akin to that of his performance. A bit more farce and less gravitas leaven with sly dark humor.
You’re not alone on the sourpuss front Sartre. I was taken by it, but it’s not in my Top 10. I loved Helena Bonham Carter and the young boy was quite good.
By the Sea, The Worst Meat Pies in London and the number where they’re singing about the different kinds of ‘meat’ were my favorites.
As I and others have noted, it was also nice to see Alan Rickman unshackled from Harry Potter.
You’re not quite wrong about the Sweeney character being kind of one note. I’d give him a little more credit than that, but I agree he’s not the most interesting part of the movie…though I’m also not sure he’s quite meant to be. I’d be curious to hear what people who are familiar with some of the stage productions might think about that.
The number where they’re singing about the different kinds of ‘meat’ is called A Little Priest.
:-)
I still haven’t seen the film (TWBB came first) but I do know the show. The film focuses much more on Sweeney Todd, but in the original production, Angela Lansbury was first-billed even though it wasn’t the title character. And after that, lead actress and lead actor got equal billing. Tim Burton turned it into a *Johnny Depp* movie that was all about the man, Sweeney Todd.
Sweeney is supposed to be a sympathetic character despite his actions. And since the film centers around him, I would think he is supposed to be the most interesting part of the movie. But I could be wrong - I haven’t seen it yet.
Yeah, any of them chime in. I’m still not sure exactly what I think of the movie. I have a hard time getting what Burton’s point really was. And I still think this one, at least in this form, would have been better off being released in October or early November. Holiday entertainment it ain’t and I think it suffers for it.
“the one about different kinds of meat” doesn’t have a very nice ring to it, does it?
Sweeney definitely gets the focus in the movie and he is sympathetic, but Sartre is correct that he’s not the most interesting part. A bad choice on Burton’s part? Perhaps, but it worked for me.
As for the point of it, I don’t know. I just took it as a fairly simple tragedy. The story of one wronged man who is so consumed by the need for vengeance, he’s unable to to find any kind of happiness even when it is offered to him in the form of a sort of cobbled together family.
The final irony is especailly moving I thought. You could see it coming from a mile away, but I don’t think it was meant to be a secret to the audience exactly.
Definitely not holiday fair. Neither is TWBB, but it didn’t get a wide release the way Sweeney did.
No, Sweeney is definitely not holiday fare. TWBB isn’t either, but it was only released very limited. A wider release will happen in 2008, after the holidays have ended, so I don’t really consider it holiday fare. Sweeney was released in time for Christmas and the tag line for its promotion was “Coming Christmas”.
I think even a couple of critics noted that Halloween might have been a better time for it to be released. Ah, well. I guess the studio wanted to cram it into December so it would be remembered by AMPAS. ;-)
I’m really a poor judge of the film’s quality because for much of the time I was thrown out of it by the style of songs. As such I’m not sure the stage version would have necessarily worked for me. I had no problem with their singing voices. I can live with less than technically pristine vocals so long as they’re expressive and characterful - and for me that’s exactly what was delivered. The lyrics were cleverly constructed and I liked some songs better than others - including those you mentioned Craig - but the music just doesn’t get through to me. My favorite song was Sasha Baron Cohen’s, reminded me a bit of Groucho Marx singing “Lydia the Tattooed Lady”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4zRe_wvJw8
Groucho Marx singing “Lydia the Tattooed Lady”. Classic stuff.
I actually was very impressed by Sweeney Todd when I first saw it a few weeks back. Second time around, I saw it with a somewhat clearer head. I still like it a good deal, and I think Sasha Baron Cohen kind of steals the show. Depp is good and all but the point about his character being one-note is unmistakably true, or at least almost unmistakably true. Still, I found it all entertaining. Not in my top ten, though, I agree.
Funny, when I think of “Lydia the Tattooed Lady” I think of Katharine Hepburn’s precocious little sister Dinah in one of my all time favortes: The Philadelphia Story.
Oh, that is a great moment in the film, Craig.
But the ‘Lydia’ scene from The Marx Brothers At the Circus truly is hilarious.
Though I think A Night at the Opera is still my all-time favorite Marx Brothers movie.
As always Alison, your taste is impeccable.
Otis B. Driftwood: Now pay particular attention to this first clause because it’s most important. It says the, uh…”The party of the first part shall be known in this contract as the party of the first part.” How do you like that? That’s pretty neat, eh?
Fiorello: No, that’s no good.
Otis B. Driftwood: What’s the matter with it?
Fiorello: I dunno. Let’s hear it again.
Otis B. Driftwood: It says the, uh…”The party of the first part shall be known in this contract as the party of the first part.”
Fiorello: That sounds a little better this time.
Otis B. Driftwood: Well, it grows on you. Would you like to hear it once more?
Fiorello: Er… just the first part.
Otis B. Driftwood: What do you mean? The… the party of the first part?
Fiorello: No, the first part of the party of the first part.
Otis B. Driftwood: All right. It says the, uh, “The first part of the party of the first part shall be known in this contract as the first part of the party of the first part shall be known in this contract…” look, why should we quarrel about a thing like this? We’ll take it right out, eh?
[Fiorello and Driftwood go over the second clause of their contract]
Otis B. Driftwood: Now, it says, uh, “The party of the second part shall be known in this contract as the party of the second part.”
Fiorello: Well, I don’t know about that…
Otis B. Driftwood: Now what’s the matter?
Fiorello: I no like-a the second party, either.
Otis B. Driftwood: Well, you should of come to the first party. We didn’t get home ’til around four in the morning. I was blind for three days!
And eventually we get to Fiorello: “Oh, you can’t fool me. There ain’t no Sanity Clause.”
LOL! Perfect follow-up.
It’s hard to even pick a favorite part of that film.
And talk of snappy dialogue. I think these guys invented it.
Oh, and since we’ve been linked to “Lydia, the Tattoed Lady”, I’ll offer my own link for all to enjoy. Ignore the Spanish subtitles:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VQpQlxjLvE
That was awesome.
Priceless.
Hey Craig, isn’t it time you knocked out a couple of walls to make more space here at LiC? The place is getting so popular that it’s hard for everyone to squeeze in.
:-)
btw, sartre, welcome to the club of Diving Bell supporters. I’m glad you enjoyed it.