Barry Levinson has gathered a big ensemble cast of great actors including Aidan Quinn, Elizabeth Perkins, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Kevin Pollak, and Joan Plowright.
It's a multi-generational story of an immigrant Polish Jewish family in Baltimore. It's Levinson's semi-autobiographical film. As such, it has some funny slice-of-life scenes like the whole family gathered up to see the first TV and the only thing on is the test screen. The family first finds success in selling TV. Eventually the extended family scatter to the winds.
It has the grand scale and the feel of the era. It has some great bits of family stories. There are great actors, and Levinson is in charge. All the pieces are in place. This should be a masterpiece, but it's not quite there. The story just go on and on and on. There really isn't any flow that ramps up to a climax. It's just a series of interesting family vignettes coming one after the other. It goes on too long.
This is essentially Levinson's home movie reshot onto the big screen. As such it is the best home movie in anybody's dusty attics. But like all those home movies, it probably means more for people who remember those times than those of us who were never there.
It's a multi-generational story of an immigrant Polish Jewish family in Baltimore. It's Levinson's semi-autobiographical film. As such, it has some funny slice-of-life scenes like the whole family gathered up to see the first TV and the only thing on is the test screen. The family first finds success in selling TV. Eventually the extended family scatter to the winds.
It has the grand scale and the feel of the era. It has some great bits of family stories. There are great actors, and Levinson is in charge. All the pieces are in place. This should be a masterpiece, but it's not quite there. The story just go on and on and on. There really isn't any flow that ramps up to a climax. It's just a series of interesting family vignettes coming one after the other. It goes on too long.
This is essentially Levinson's home movie reshot onto the big screen. As such it is the best home movie in anybody's dusty attics. But like all those home movies, it probably means more for people who remember those times than those of us who were never there.