LIBERTY HEIGHTS A film review by David N. Butterworth Copyright 1999 David N. Butterworth
*** (out of ****)
"No Jews, dogs, or coloreds" reads the sign that hangs from the chain link fence by the entrance to a public lake in the eastern section of Baltimore in the mid-1950s. Since dogs can't read, and none of them can recall ever having seen a colored person sunbathing, this sign must be strictly for the Jews, yes? So surmises one of a group of three friends, three Jewish friends, whose teenage experiences with race, religion, and prejudice form the center of Barry Levinson's "Liberty Heights."
It's the fourth nostalgic return to the director's hometown in a series that has previously included "Diner," "Tin Men," and "Avalon." While not as consistently well-written as "Diner," nor as bitingly funny as "Tin Men," "Liberty Heights" is a solid comedy-drama that contains lots of satisfying little moments rather than any significant big ones.
If "Diner" could launch the careers of Steve Guttenberg, Paul Reiser, Kevin Bacon, Daniel Stern, Timothy Daly, and Mickey Rourke, then who's to say that Adrien Brody and Ben Foster--who play brothers Van and Ben Kurtzman respectively--don't have a shot at future stardom?
Brody and Foster are pretty terrific in "Liberty Heights," as are most of the performers in the film, including Joe Mantegna and Bebe Neuwirth as their parents. Mantegna's Nate Kurtzman runs a burlesque house and a numbers racket on the side and Neuwirth is his loving, supportive wife. As for their sons, Ben gets involved with a colored girl, and Van falls in love with Cinderella with a magic wand, a well-to-do beauty he meets at a Halloween party.
There's a lot of wacky and not-so wacky situations spurred along by Levinson's characteristically-incisive writing and ear for quotable dialogue. Notably strong is the relationship between Ben and Sylvia, especially the staunch loyalty they show each other. Propelling the story forward is a varied score by Andrea Morricone, son of the great and prolific Italian composer Ennio Morricone ("The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly," "The Mission," "The Legend of 1900") which, every now and again, reveals touches of his father's brilliance. Levinson has shown immaculate taste in bringing him onboard.
Like Nate's mist green '55 Cadillac, "Liberty Heights" is a pleasure to behold. For Levinson and his followers, it only goes to show you can go home again, and again.
-- David N. Butterworth dnb@dca.net
Got beef? Visit "La Movie Boeuf" online at http://members.dca.net/dnb
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews