I LIKE IT LIKE THAT
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1994 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: This comedy-drama set in a Spanish
section of the Bronx tries to hard to reach too broad a
range of tones and is stretched too thin. A family
falling apart and coming together is the subject of
newcomer writer-director Darnell Martin. Fewer
characters better observed would have made for stronger
drama and less cliched comedy. Rating: low +1 (-4 to
+4)
I LIKE IT LIKE THAT is the first major studio film written and directed by a black woman. When actually watching the film it generally flows fairly smoothly, though in retrospect the styles represented in the film are very much a mixed bag. To have in a single film sex scenes verging on slapstick and grim scenes of street violence makes one wonder if the writer/director, Darnell Martin, was managing the tone of the film as a whole or in pieces. It almost seems as if she was optimizing individual scenes without thinking of the film as a whole. The unevenness of tone extends even to the title. This is a film with a lot of people at various levels of dissatisfaction which would much more aptly be titled I HATE IT LIKE THIS
In a Puerto Rican neighborhood in the Bronx, the street constantly boils with activity, but nowhere more than the bedroom of Lisette and Chino (played by Lauren Velez and Jon Seda). Chino is into marathon love-making, much to the amusement of the neighborhood and the boredom of Lisette. Chino feeds a family of five on a McJob but wants to provide some luxuries for his family. A blackout brings what Chino sees as an opportunity. Now Lisette has to feed a family of four and visit a husband in jail on no job at all. But a rather contrived set of circumstances gets Lisette a high-paying job in the recording industry working closely with a slightly sleazy executive (Griffin Dunne) who is sexually attracted to her. Rumors of her having been seen with the executive reach Chino in prison and when he is released he wants to set matters straight. What ensues is a comedy-drama of Lisette's on-again off-again relationship with her husband and the struggle of the family to pull together.
At times the film achieves some of the strengths of MARTY as self-seeking family and friends try to interfere in the relationship of Lisette and Chino, but with the exception of a surprisingly well-drawn and acted Li'l Chino, played by ten-year-old Tomas Melly, most of the peripheral characters are a bit cartoonish. Griffin Dunne's record executive is a one-dimensional cliche. Rita Moreno as Chino's overly strident mother is magnetic but more in her delivery than in her lines. Jesse Borego is a bit too swishy and over-the-top as Alex/Alexis, Lisette's brother, soon to be sister. Velez's performance as Lisette is the heart of the story and she does carry the film, though not always with sufficient help from the script. One scene of her handling her tension by suddenly flashing into a dance just does not seem realistic and Velez handles it as well as any actress could. Seda only at times develops a screen presence.
Martin could well turn out to be a very good director, but her technique needs refining. I would give this film a low +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
mark.leeper@att.com
.
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