This is One Italian Family You’ll Remember For a Long Time

A realistically uproarious look at an Italian family (The Rizzos) living on the outskirts of New York in a seaside fishing village named City Island. With New York City looming in the background, each family member has his own secret dreams and desires. Andy Garcia stars as Vince Rizzo and his with Joyce is played by TV’s (The Good Wife’s) Julianna Margulies.

Raymond De Felitta is the writer and director of this over-the-top exaggeration of modern family Italian life. The film is refreshingly funny and real. The film “Moonstruck” comes to mind as the Italian stereotypes and nuances are of core. The Rizzo’s are a loud and dramatic family in their everyday conversations. The dinner table is the place where most issues are laid out on the line and no one escapes scrutiny. The banter is fresh, witty and fast-paced. The crisp script and talented actors all add to make City Island a winner.

The Rizzos harbor secrets and that’s what makes the film so much fun.  Vince (Andy Garcia), who is a corrections officer, informs his wife Joyce ( Julianna Margulies) that he's going to be out playing poker for the evening when he's really taking acting classes in Manhattan. Joyce, who smokes cigarettes on the sly, is certain that Vince is having an extramarital affair as she's caught him in his lie. Vince is too embarrassed to share his desire of being an actor to the family and goes to great lengths to protect his secret.

The home also has a teen boy Vinnie (Ezra Miller), who loves to spy on his over-weight neighbor who he discovers has a webcam and her own computer website. This website has paid chat-rooms focusing on eating large amounts of food. Yes, its secret living large eating time and no one in the family discovers that Vinnie goes over to the neighbor’s house to find out first hand what’s going on in that wacky kitchen of hers.

Daughter Vivian, Dominik Garcia-Lorido, is in fact Andy Garcia's real-life daughter. She has lost her college scholarship and finds that working at the local adult club where she may take off a few articles of clothing has tremendously enhanced her chances for earning the lost tuition money. All of this of course is done without the knowledge of anyone in the family.

During the film, we do view Vince at acting class with his drama coach, played by Alan Arkin, and these scenes are some of the best in the film. He also begins to spend lots of time on scene study with his acting partner, Emily Mortimer. Their ‘acting homework’ is to reveal a secret to your acting partner and then to the class. Vince has a big secret that is revealed early in the film, an inmate at his prison is his long-lost son, Tony (Steven Strait), from a previous relationship. Vince invites the soon-to-be ex-con to finish out his sentence by doing odd jobs around his house. From here, the plot is set in motion as Tony who is now living in the garage begins to uncover everyone’s secrets.

The film’s draw is Garcia; viewing him in an acting class is wonderful and when he finally gets a chance at a real audition, we are only drawn in further. The audition is for a Scorsese mob movie, (of course) and Garcia delivers a tense and nervous tryout that will be appreciated by budding actors for years to come.

One thing I can tell you is that all secrets are revealed and plenty of lessons are learned from one another about the dangers of keeping them.

Sarah Adamson © April 2010