TNMC
This site’s design is only visible in a graphical browser that supports web standards, but its content is accessible to any browser or Internet device.
Mambo Argentino
We're continuing our busy week with a review of the screenplay to Mambo Italiano. I liked it and Hollyfeld felt the same way. We also have my brief thoughts on two foreign movies that I absolutely loved. Next up, a script review of The Day After Tomorrow.
Mambo Italiano Script Review
"Deadpool and I are good friends (missed deadlines notwithstanding). We talk all the time and I think have a pretty good idea of what each other likes, at least filmwise. So last year, when he kept going on about this little Canadian movie he saw called Nuit de Noces, I said, 'Fine, shut up already. I'm sure it’s great.' Then, finally, he sent me a copy of the thing. I felt pretty good about receiving it. It meant that he'd finally be able to stop yammering about it. Then I watched it, and I couldn't shut up. I kept telling people about this great little film that came out of the dark, forbidden realm that we Americans call Canada, and when they sounded even remotely interested I showed them. And then they kept talking about it. You know all the fuss that was made about My Big Fat Greek Wedding? Well, the same thing, just within Hollyfeld’s inner circle.
I'm not here to review Nuit de Noces. I'm here to review the script to the same filmmaker’s follow-up, Emile Gaudreault’s and Steve Gallucio’s Mambo Italiano (from Gallucio’s play of the same name). And the reason I'm excited about doing so is not just because Mambo Italiano is, like Nuit, a sweet and funny movie, but that it’s also something that my fellow Americans should get a chance to see. It’s in English, it has a recognizable name attached to it (Paul Sorvino - not the biggest name in the world but hardly someone at whom one should sneeze), and again, it’s pretty good.
Mambo Italiano is a tale about a gay Italian-Canadian coming to grips with being gay and Italian-Canadian. This, in and of itself, was interesting. I didn't even know they had Italian-Canadians. Yeah, the whole 'coming out' aspect at first seems played out, but I've found that this is the joy of Gaudreault’s films. He takes a relatively simple concept (telling a girl you love her in Nuit de Noces, coming out here), something that in any other film would have been a subplot at best, and somehow wraps an absorbing narrative around it. If I knew how he did it, I myself would be making films. It pisses me off, quite frankly.
Anyway, Luke Kirby (one of the stars of Halloween: Resurrection, but hey, actors have to eat, right?) stars as Angelo, the son of overwhelmingly Italian parents, who knows for a fact that he’s gay. He knows for a fact that his lover and childhood friend Nino is gay. He knows for a fact that both of their parents would hate them for all time because of this. He doesn't know for a fact that Nino is in denial about it - in fact, Angelo seems completely in denial about Nino’s being in denial. And of course, when their parents find out, they deny this. When Nino finds out that they know, Angelo finds that Nino denies it. But I deny that the screenplay begins and ends here.
In most scripts, the worst-case scenario of coming out to your parents consists of being thrown out of the household, abandoned as a child. But Gallucio and Gaudreault look beyond that and find many other factors that really ground us in Angelo’s situation. He needs to stay closeted for his sister’s sake, for one thing. If he gets kicked out, that’s the end of it for him, but his sister still lives at home and would have to deal with the melodrama forever. For example, she notes, their mother still hasn't gotten over Aunt Yolanda’s death.
ANGELO
She died twenty years ago!
ANNA (having made her point)
Yah!
It’s easy to have sympathy for Angelo and his sister - I think most of us can sympathize with having high-strung parents. Imagine a high-strung neighborhood. The screenwriters are exceptional at creating such a strong sense of place and community in Mambo Italiano. Whether we're in the Italian-Canadian community, the 'gay village' or where have you, there’s always a sense that it’s a real, lived-in area - not a static locale created for the purposes of shooting a movie. Even the opinions of the area feel real. Gino, Angelo’s father and Paul Sorvino, has very distinct feelings about immigrating to Canada from the old country:
GINO
Nobody told us there were two Americas: the real one, the United States, and the fake one, Canada! And then to make things worse, you find out that there are two Canadas: the real one, Quebec, and the fake one, Ontario!
I find myself talking very little about the plot to Mambo Italiano because yeah, there isn't that much of one, so what there is should come as fluidly and surprisingly as possible. And I find myself trying not to give too much away about the characters and situations that arise because I'd like everyone else to discover them for themselves and not to have it ruined by some stupid internet critic. But there are a few things I want to make clear:
Mambo Italiano has all the makings of an adorable dramatic comedy, and is being made by a man who has proved with Nuit de Noces (if you can at all find it, do it) that he knows how to do this kind of thing right. It has characters that are at once funny and cinematic while never seeming anything less than real. It has situations that aren't wild and hilarious - they are simple and genuine and only become hilarious because of the way the characters react to them. And if it is released in America, it may or may not be the blockbuster My Big Fat Greek Wedding was, but it is probably going to be deserving of similar success. It’s one of those deceptively delightful movies - the kind that looks like the easiest thing in the world to pull off, but is probably harder to concoct that anything Hollywood cooks up. It’s not perfect, but it’s perfectly charming.
I haven't seen it yet (shooting just completed recently), but the advance buzz is apparently quite good, so maybe we'll get a chance to sit down with some Italian real soon. It’s a sweet and nicely written film, and worth finding whenever you can."
(Review submitted by Hollyfeld)
Foreign Love
I was in a strange mood last weekend. I treated myself to two subtitled movies back to back. The first one was the very popular Chinese film, Shaolin Soccer. A friend of mine passed me his DVD copy of it. The movie will open under the Miramax banner sometime during Spring 2003 in North America, dubbed in English. I liked it. I laughed out loud a few times. Writer/director and lead actor Stephen Chow is extremely good. His character's quest to find a proper way to preach the Shaolin Kung-fu lifestyle is hilarious. Wong Yut Fei as his brother, Iron Head is even funnier. Chow did a fine job of mixing laughs and action. There's no doubt this movie will make some money next spring. I'm sure it's even more spectacular to see on the big screen.
The second movie I rented was Nueve Reinas (Nine Queens) from Argentina. It's written and directed by Fabian Bielinsky. Basically it's a heist movie about two con men, Marcos (Ricardo Darin) and Juan (Gaston Pauls), who are going to pull one big score selling forgeries of nine rare German Weimar Republic stamps, a.k.a. The Nine Queens, to a rich on-the-run businessman Vidal Gandolfo (Ignasi Abadal). Bielinksky somehow channelled David Mamet while writing the screenplay to this film. A nicely written and well-crafted story with a twist and turn at every corner. I absolutely loved this movie. It's now out on DVD, Sony Classics released it in theatres in the spring but nobody seems to have realized it. Someone should definitely try to remake this (Hell, maybe David Mamet should do it?). I loved Letecia Bredice, who plays Marcos' sister Valeria. She's lovely and talented. I hope Hollywood calls her soon. Make sure to rent this picture.
Stay tuned...
That's all folks...
Jean-François Allaire (aka DeadPool)
Questions, comments, praise etc. Email me at deadpool@tnmc.org
Jean-François Allaire is TNMC's first columnist. At only 24 years old he has become a respected entertainment journalist, with his columns appearing in Corona's Coming Attractions and Scr(i)pt magazine. He also writes a monthly column in Screenwriters Monthly entitled 'The Last Word.' Hailing from Montreal this young writer is determined to dig up all the details on the movies before they hit your local theater. If you're part of a movie production then you really need to be talking to him.
