City Island (2009—104 mins) Andy Garcia, J. Margulies

   Every weekend that I work and pick out the selections of movies from the Red Box I like to always get at least one Indy type movie. A lot of times it works out good b/c since I am there on a Sat and Sunday morning there tends to be slim pickins so I have to get one. And typically these Indy’s are movies I have never heard of before (see After.Life, Peacock, Don McKay). City Island is one such movie and it’s one of the better ones we have seen. Sure most of them are actually pretty good and are often non mainstream in subject nature as well, but that is usually why they are good.

   City Island is about a family in a small NY Town near the Bronx who all have one thing in common. They are all hiding secrets from each other. These are not world shattering secrets generally but ones that they could avoid the trouble of arguing over things if they would share some of it with each other. See, at the bottom of the family is a lack of communication. They have their dinner every night and go thru their routines every week and just don’t discuss much of anything. For instance Vince (Garcia) keeps telling his wife that he is going to a poker game so that he can attend acting lessons without her knowing. This naturally eventually leads her to think he is cheating on her…. You can kinda see where this is going. Sure as a comedy all of these things point to a modern day version of a Three’s Company episode but it really works out well as a movie. We get invested in the whole family even if most of them are kinda idiots or ridiculous. I do like some of the little nods and metaphors thrown in here. The whole family as a metaphor for the bigger secrets are ALL hiding they fact that they all smoke from each other. It’s a good nod to overall secrets and makes for a good chuckle in the overall movie as well. There are other story archs that are in there as a big secret but I don’t really want to spoil it for you.

   MArgulies is good as Vince’s wife even if her accent is a real odd mish-mash of Jersey/NY/Boston all kinda thrown into one so it doesn’t sound good or bad but it also doesn’t distract as much as it could.

Verdict—> I liked this movie a lot. Good pacing, good story and wraps itself up into a nice big box. I would say if you see it go ahead and grab it. It’s not necessarily a Rom-Com, more of a Dram-Com but it is def. an enjoyable watch. Not much of a kids movie at PG-13. Remember it’s not a mainstream movie but I think most people will enjoy it as a good story driven movie.

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