Sunshine Cleaning (2009) Review

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(More customer reviews)Every review I've read has been quasi-negative but not being one to listen to critics, I took a chance. I was very pleasantly surprised. Depending on why you go to a movie, you may not like this because it is not escapism. It deals with real life issues and things most of us can relate to. I found the movie to be very refreshing and all the characters real to life. The main character is a single mom trying to raise a precocious son. She has to deal with a dead-end relationship and an aging father, an irresponsible sister and a job she hates. How she copes and what she does is more believable than most of the "chick flick" films out today. I think this is one of the better movies in a sea of fluff to spend time and money on. Amy Adams is wonderful and it is always refreshing to see Alan Arkin. Please don't dismiss this film because of iffy reviews. It is worth going to see.

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Academy Award® Nominee Amy Adams, Golden Globe® Winner Emily Blunt, and Academy Award Winner®Alan Arkin find an unexpected way to turn their lives around in this “colorful, refreshingly quirky comic drama” (Leah Rozen, People). Desperate to get her son into a better school, single mom Rose (Amy Adams) persuades her slacker sister Norah (Emily Blunt) to join her in the crime scene cleanup business to make some quick cash. With the help of their ill-fated salesman father (Alan Arkin), they climb the ranks in a very dirty job, finding themselves up to their elbows in murders, suicides, and… specialized situations. But underneath the dust and grime they also come to discover a true respect for one another, and create a brighter future for the entire Lorkowski family.

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City Island (2010) Review

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(More customer reviews)It sounds glib to call Raymond De Felitta's "City Island" this year's "Little Miss Sunshine," yet the comparison is apt. Both films depict dysfunctional families nearing collapse, and both are blessed with razor-sharp screenplays and ensemble casts that are wonderfully, hilariously perfect. Each member of the cast (especially top-billed Andy Garcia) gives an Oscar-worthy performance, and all will be robbed if they don't win the Screen Actors Guild Best Ensemble Cast Award next year.
The eponymous "City Island" is a small community just off the shoreline of the Bronx, officially part of that borough but with a small-town charm all its own. As Molly Charlesworth (Emily Mortimer), one of the film's characters, declares, "It's a cross between New England and Washington Heights!" Vince Rizzo (Andy Garcia) is a "clamdigger" (a lifelong resident of City Island), as opposed to a "mussel-sucker" (someone who moves to City Island, or one of those very rare natives who moves away). Vince works as a prison guard (though he prefers the term "corrections officer"), but that job doesn't seem to satisfy him these days. His wife Joyce (Julianna Margulies), daughter Vivian (Dominik Garcia-Lorido) and son Vince Jr. (Ezra Miller) wonder why Vince has a "poker game" almost every night, and also why he's brought paroled convict Tony Nardella (Steven Strait) home to live with them. The other Rizzos, meanwhile, are harboring secrets of their own...
To reveal any more of the plot would be sabotage. Let's just say the bickering of the Rizzo family reaches critical mass, with catharsis to follow. In any case, you fall in love with all the characters, and although you might be a little leery of some of the things they do, you'd still be happy to have them all over for your Sunday barbeque. "City Island" is a funny, charming, touching must-see.

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Vince Rizzo (Andy Garcia) is a lifelong resident of the tiny, tradition-steeped Bronx enclave of City Island. A family man who makes his living as a corrections officer, Vince longs to become an actor. Ashamed to admit his aspirations to his family, Vince would rather let his fiery wife Joyce (Julianna Margulies) believe his weekly poker games are a cover for an extramarital affair than admit he’s secretly taking acting classes in Manhattan. When Vince is asked to reveal his biggest secret in class, he inadvertently sets off a chaotic chain of events that turns his mundane suburban life upside down. Winner of the Audience Award at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival, City Island spins a web of misrepresentations, misinterpretations and misunderstandings into a smart and charming comedy about a family that stops at nothing to avoid the truth.

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