AMONGST FRIENDS (director/writer: Rob Weiss; cinematographer: Michael Bonvillain; editor: Leo Trombetta; cast: Steve Parlavecchio (Andy), Mira Sorvino (Laura), Patrick Mc Gaw (Trevor), Joseph Lindsey (Billy), Michael Artura (Michael), Frank Medrano (Vic), Louis Lombardi (Eddie), David Stepkin (Jack Trattner), Ford Sorvino (Fish); Runtime: 90; 1993)
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
This Scorsese "Mean Streets" type of film has been done too many times and often much better than it was done here, for it to have much of an impact. It was mildly entertaining, setting a wiseguy mood in a wealthy suburban area instead of using the usual locale of the gritty urban streets. It was sort of funny hearing the wise philosophy coming out of such empty heads, pontificated by old mobsters (especially Ford Sorvino-Mira's grandfather) to young potential mobsters, who already looked just as stupid as their mentors. There was also a very funny bit, featuring fast-talking heavyweights in matching designer jog suits named Vic and Eddie (Frank Medrano and Louis Lombardi). But the film had such a pat look to it, I just couldn't help feel that it was phony, an annual staging of a movie about wannabe Mafia youths that seems to be the dream-baby of almost every new indie director. It seemed to be striving to get some laughs, release some suburban angst, while trying to find the missing ingredient in its tale of innocence lost...which it never found.
Three inseparable childhood friends, sons of the privileged, Andy (Steve Parlavecchio), Trevor (Patrick McGaw), and Billy (Joseph Lindsey) have grown up in the Long Island suburbs of Five Towns. They enjoyed doing petty crimes as youngsters for the respect they got and because they were bored. After finishing high school, in the late 1980s, Billy asks Andy to make a drug delivery for him. Andy says yes, then changes his mind and gets Trevor to do it for him. Trevor thinks Andy is too scared to do it and decides to help his friend out but gets arrested in a police sting. After serving two years of hard time and feeling disillusioned, he fails to return to his home town. But he is anxious to see his one-time girlfriend Laura (Mira Sorvino), whom he has not seen or written to while in prison. It is never made clear if Billy set his friends up, but the implication is, that he did, in order to get rid of the competition.
Trevor comes back home by motorcycle and with a different attitude after being away for four years, and plans to see Laura and then leave for California with his motorcycle friend. Billy, in the meantime, becomes a big-time hood while Andy, who is now 23-years-old, stagnates and is disgusted that Billy treats him contemptuously as his gopher. Andy wants to make one big score, on his own. He comes from wealthy parents and could always get the money he needs from them -- but he's all about proving himself, wanting very much to be recognized as a big criminal operator. He sees his opportunity through a drug deal, where he needs $25,000 to get in on that deal. He decides to rob a nightclub with the gang he put together, even though he knows it is run by a Jewish mobster. He talks the weak-minded Trevor into going along with the heist.
The old-time Jewish gangster club owner named Jack Trattner (David Stepkin), asks his vicious enforcer, Michael (Artura), to get the ones who took his money and diamonds. The 26-year-old first-time director Rob Weiss, has this low-budget film put all its cards on the action table, moving it along at a fast clip. The story highlights how different the three friends turned out to be as young adults and how Billy so easily betrays his friends. The weakness of this plot, is that the friendship among the three never seemed to be anything but a superficial one, yet we are supposed to believe it is packed with a great deal of emotion at present.
Trevor is the only one of the three who we can be sympathetic to. He is looking for a different way of life and is searching to find out what really makes him happy, having learned that it is not money. Andy needs to come of age, to realize he has to grow up and can't be stuck with the same twisted mental attitude he had as a kid. Billy is just a bad egg, a weasel. It is difficult to find one thing about him that is likable. I also found it hard to believe that he became a big-time criminal, he just seemed to be too punky.
The problem with this creepy friendship tale, one solely based on criminal schemes and drug deals, is ultimately the problem with this film -- because when the friendship breaks up, who cares! And if we don't care, the film becomes empty, though it's good for a few laughs. The main joke seems to be that the kids learn to respect their elders, not their parents who have become wealthy the old-fashioned way through their talent, but their grandfathers who were crooks like they are and who see their grandsons as them when they were young.
REVIEWED ON 7/23/2000 GRADE: C+
Dennis Schwartz: "Ozus' World Movie Reviews"
http://www.sover.net/~ozus
ozus@sover.net
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