Film Reviews

Romance and Cigarettes

• Rating:
• Director: John Turturro
• Starring: James Gandolfini
• Details: US, 115mins, 15s.

"There are two things a guy should be able to do - be romantic and smoke his brains out" Chain-smoking Nick (Gandolfini) is a blue collar ironworker who builds and repairs bridges for a living. Married to dressmaker Kitty (Sarandon), with whom he has three daughters who have their own punk band, their quiet life gets turned upside down when Kitty finds that Nick is having a torrid affair with highly-sexed redhead Tula (Kate Winslet). Refusing to speak to him but refusing to throw him out, Kitty enrols the help of her '50s throwback cousin Bo (Walken) to seek revenge on the sultry Tula while Nick tries to make a decision - a life of sex with Tula or a life of love with Kitty.
Written and directed by John Turturro, this down and dirty musical plays for laughs and, like Johnny Depp's 'Cry Baby', it's not to be taken seriously. The cast don't sing original music but lip-synch along to (mostly) '60s soul tunes when they aren't spouting some of the crudest, yet witty, dialogue heard in some time. It's the almost unrecognisable, tarted-up Winslet in a supporting role that steals the film from her leading stars, as she has never looked sexier and seems to revel in a role that is amass of contradictions; her sex-kitten persona is coupled with a deep-lying insecurity as she feels sex is all she has to offer. As a fun, tongue-in-cheek musical, it works but as a straight forward narrative, it leaves a little to be desired.

Review by Gavin Burke