About My Father: A droll surprise

About My Father (2023) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for suggestive material, mild profanity and partial nudity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang

Given Robert De Niro’s penchant for dumb comedies, this release was approached with a wary eye.

 

No need to worry.

 

Although Salvo (Robert De Niro, right) long ago promised a treasured family heirloom
when his son Sebastian (Sebastian Maniscalco) became ready to pop the question to a
True Love, this agreement comes with a hitch: Salvo first wants to meet his
son's fiancée's family.

Director Laura Terruso’s delightful little film is both hilarious and heartwarming, thanks to a sharply tuned script by star Sebastian Maniscalco and co-writer Austen Earl. They deftly avoid the numb-nuts slapstick that frequently infects such projects, while still including one side-splittingly bawdy set-piece that’s certain to go viral (and deservedly so).

An additional blessing: None of these characters resorts to screaming, or the tiresome hurling of breakable objects at each other. Disagreements and arguments, sure: even occasional raised voices … but it feels authentic, and not contrived.

 

This obviously results from Maniscalco’s input, relying on the “immigrant growing up in America” experience that he has honed so well in his stand-up act. He’s a natural born storyteller, particularly when it comes to his own story (or a somewhat, um, enhanced reading of same).

 

Sicilian-born Salvo (De Niro), a hard-working hairdresser, long ago moved his family to Chicago, in order to grant his son what all parents desire: better opportunities for their children. Sebastian (Maniscalco) has indeed thrived, rising to a coveted position within the city’s Hilton hotel chain. He also has fallen in love with budding artist Ellie (Leslie Bibb) — who possesses more enthusiasm than talent — and who adores him in return.

 

Their personalities are wildly different. He’s reserved and somewhat wary, content with his place in the universe. She’s open and ready for anything, cheerfully applying just the right pressure to occasionally take Sebastian out of his comfort zone (in good ways). Maniscalco and Bibb are adorable together.

 

The only remaining detail, in Sebastian’s mind, is the perfect when and where to pop The Question. He also requests his grandmother’s heirloom ring, which Salvo long ago promised his son could give to The One.

 

But Salvo is concerned. Ellie comes from a super-rich family with a palatial estate in Virginia (and at least one more home elsewhere). Her father, Bill Collins (David Rasche), is a captain of industry and CEO of a rival luxury hotel chain; her mother, the aptly named Tigger (Kim Cattrall) — because she has claws — is a firebrand, ultra-conservative U.S. Senator.

 

And while they’re both immigrant families, the Collins clan beat Salvo’s family to American shores by quite a few generations, having arrived on a modest little ship called The Mayflower.

 

How, Salvo worries, could Sebastian possible fit into their world? Worse yet, would they look down on him?

 

Sex and the City: Cash and Carrie

Sex and the City (2008) • View trailer for Sex and the City
3.5 stars (out of five). Rating: R, for profanity, vulgarity, nudity and sexual content
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 5.30.08
Buy DVD: Sex and the City • Buy Blu-Ray: Sex and the City: The Movie [Blu-ray]


Samantha no doubt would disagree, but I’m afraid there is such a thing as too much Sex.

Although longtime executive producer and Sex and the City series writer Michael Patrick King both wrote and directed this big-screen continuation of the hit HBO comedy/drama — and while I’ve no doubt this film will be the bee’s knees for legions of adoring fans — the long-awaited result is self-indulgent and somewhat irritating.

When Samantha (Kim Cattrall, far left) attends an auction with the intention of
purchasing one particular piece, she and her longtime gal pals — from left,
Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Charlotte (Kristin
Davis) — are dismayed to see another person bidding quite aggressively for
the same item.

Self-indulgent because, at a thumping 145 minutes, this film is almost half a season’s worth of the half-hour TV episodes.

Somewhat irritating because, having left everybody — the show’s characters and us fans — in a happy place when the series rode off into the New York City sunset in February 2004, King rains on everybody’s parade by screwing up key relationships.

Yep, Carrie and Big are on the outs. Again.

And so are Miranda and Steve.

And so are Samantha and Smith.

Sigh.

The always witty and hilariously smutty dialogue aside, one expects better than tired, predictable melodrama from a franchise with such a smart pedigree. This movie feels driven more by studio greed than a need for further explore these characters.

I recall being similarly annoyed (on a much more superficial level) when, having brought Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson into each other’s loving arms at the conclusion of Spider-Man 2, that series’ producers decided the only way they could obtain dramatic tension for the third film was to rip them apart again.

This is the tried-and-true tactic of afternoon soap operas, where plot developments emerge less from the logic of established characters and their distinctive behavior, and more because some idiot decides to throw a spanner into the gears.

While it’s genuinely delightful to see Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Charlotte (Kristin Davis), Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Samantha (Kim Cattrall) once again strutting their Manhattan streets in search of labels, by rights — and by six seasons, and 94 episodes of the series — they should have gotten the other “L” (love) worked out by now.

Indeed, they did get it worked out. We saw it happen back in early 2004, when Carrie abandoned her ill-advised Parisian fantasy and allowed Big (Chris Noth) to sweep her back into his arms.

And when Miranda finally came to terms with her admittedly unusual but still emotionally satisfying relationship with Steve (David Eigenberg).

And particularly when Samantha came to terms with her cancer, and the debilitating effects of chemo, and watched in amazement as Smith (Jason Lewis) not only stood by her, but delivered quite possibly the most swooningly romantic “bouquet” in the history of such gestures.

Charlotte, for her part, had found true happiness a bit sooner than her friends, in the devoted arms of Harry (Evan Handler), her amazingly sweet and satisfying husband.