City By the Sea

Year 15, Day 3 - 1/3/23 - Movie #4,303

BEFORE: I'm back at the movie theater today, for the first time since December 19, that's a full two weeks off from working screenings, and I need to get back in the swing of things, my sleeping schedule is even worse than normal, and I'm suffering from too much stress at the other job, because it always feels like the company is a few weeks from closing.  Making an animated feature is a great way to keep a company constantly running out of money, it turns out.  I'm not sure why anybody does this, because the choices seem to be making the film very quickly and running out of money quickly, or spreading the production out over time and running out of money a bit more slowly - there doesn't seem to BE a third option.  Anyway, the company is holding art sales and animation classes and DVD sales and bake sales just to get through the next couple of months, and then, who knows.  The future is uncertain, but that's independent filmmaking for you, you struggle like crazy just to stay afloat.  Or maybe you skip town like the festival organizers in Narrowsburg and leave a trail of unpaid debts behind...

Robert De Niro carries over from "The Family" and becomes the first actor to qualify for this year's year-end wrap-up.  Seems about right. Frances McDormand is here tonight, for the third film of the year, which is weird because she was also in the third film of 2022, "The French Dispatch" - maybe what's weird is that I realized that, this sort of thing probably happens all the time, but I'm just not aware of it. By coincidence, the film screening at the movie theater tonight is "Women Talking", with Frances McDormand in the cast. 

THE PLOT: Vincent Lamarca, whose father was executed for a 1950's kidnapping of a child, grew up to become a police officer, only to see his own son become a murder suspect. 

AFTER: The "City by the Sea" mentioned in the title here is supposed to be Long Beach, NY which is a community out on Long Island - I've been there because there's a BBQ restaurant there called Swingbelly's, and I make it my business to know every notable BBQ restaurant within a 30-mile radius of my home.  Seriously, don't get me talking about BBQ because you'll never get me to shut up about it - or hey, if you need a recommendation on where to get some killer 'cue, I'm your guy.  Even if that's where to eat in Texas, Memphis, Nashville, the Carolinas, or upstate. (I have yet to visit St. Louis or Kansas City, but the other BBQ meccas, I've covered them.)

The tunny thing is, I remember Long Beach being a very nice little town, very suburban, homey, and even though I wasn't allowed to participate in the Swingbelly's eating challenge (that's a full slab of ribs, 1/4 pound of pork on texas toast, 1/4 pound of brisket on texas toast, 4 wings, 3 rib tips, 2 sides and 2 pieces of cornbread in 1 hour) because my wife nixed it, I don't hold any grudge against the town.  However, this film made it look like a really brokedown garbage pit full of abandoned seaside casinos and attractions - think Coney Island after you dropped a bomb on it. Ah, mystery solved, the IMDB is telling me that those scenes were shot in Asbury Park, NJ and/or Ocean Grove, NJ - so NOT Long Beach.  If I were the Long Beach town council I'd have sued the production company for defamation, just saying. So good news, if you're into beach culture, Long Beach might be a nice place to visit - I didn't visit the beach there, just the BBQ place. 

This makes some kind of sense now, because Asbury Park definitely went through some rough years around the time that "City by the Sea" was filmed.  Palace Amusements, prominently seen in this film (you can spot the old-timey mascot "Tillie" on the building exterior), shut down in 1988, and the whole area started a revitalization effort in 2002, with the casino and boardwalk pavilions re-opening in 2005. Perhaps the film studio swooped in and took advantage of the city's troubles since they were looking for that "bombed-out Beirut" look, and maybe if they paid a location fee that helped spur the rebuilding efforts. In a perfect world, anyway. I also see that Asbury Park was one of the few beachfront communities in NJ that wasn't affected that badly by Hurricane Sandy in 2012, and they were ready for the summer season in 2013. 

The other thing I noticed in the background. when Vincent picked up his girlfriend every night from the Broadway theater where she worked, was the Howard Johnson's in Times Square.  Man, I've never eaten there but somehow I still miss it - that place was legendary, but closed down in 2005.  There were regulars who'd eaten there for decades, and waiters who worked there just as long.  I also miss the Automats, and I never ate at those either - what the heck happened to giant dining halls that served decent food at a fair price?  How did that business model manage to fail?  I know, I know, times changed and people wanted more out of their restaurants somehow, they wanted theme restaurants and entertainment, and became willing to pay higher prices for all of that.  All I know is, there's a Margaritaville off Times Square now, to go with the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. and the Hard Rock Café, and I wish them well, but they all sound like rip-off joints to me.  If you can't bring back the Automat, at least make sure that Ellen's Stardust Diner stays in business - it's the one with the waiters who are all trying to get cast in Broadway shows, so they sing at the Diner while they're working shifts. If you don't get your food on time, it's probably because your waiter was literally singing for his supper. 

Anyway, the movie bounces between the two communities, Long Beach and the Times Square area.  Vincent Lamarca used to be a cop in Long Beach, and then moved to Manhattan.  Bear in mind that it's about 21 miles between the two, but 27 miles if you have to drive it. That's because there's no good way to go, you either have to take the Queens Midtown Tunnel out of town, and take 495 out to the Cross Island and switch to the Southern Parkway, or go all the way up to the RFK Bridge and catch the 678 out to JFK airport, from there it's just a hop, skip and a jump, but who wants to get stuck in airport traffic?  You could be there for hours...  

But looking at the map, I see a HUGE problem with the plot of the film, in which a dead body tossed into the "river" in Long Beach somehow makes its way to where it washes ashore, somewhere in Brooklyn (where you can see the South St. Seaport in the background).  Yeah, this just doesn't work, because if you look at Long Beach on the map, it's not on a river, the beach borders the Atlantic Ocean.  And the spot where they find the body is on the East River, but the water in the East River comes from Long Island Sound, which is NORTH of Long Island, and Long Beach is on the SOUTH of the island.  So that's not likely the body would wash that way, even if you account for the tides rolling in and out. I remember learning that New York Harbor is an estuary, which means that there's a complex system of tides and currents, but I think a body moving 27 miles from Long Beach to DUMBO is a bit of a stretch. 

What's even harder to believe, and this reminds me of what was unlikely in "The Family" last night, is that Joey kills the drug dealer Picasso in Long Beach, and then the next day the cop who investigates the body washed ashore in Brooklyn turns out to be Joey's father.  Exactly what are the odds against that?  There are about 36,000 police officers in NYC, so you tell me. Gotta call a big NITPICK POINT on this, for tidal reasons as well as the odds against the killer being related to the cop. 

After that, though, there's a good mix of family drama and crime drama here, as cop Vincent has a relationship with Michelle, the woman who lives in the apartment directly below him (commonly known as a "Manhattan Special", I think) and their relationship works, as long as neither one mentions the word "marriage" or tries to find out too much about the other's past.  But Michelle then decides that she DOES want to get to know him, but then once Vincent's son is in trouble, he has to own the fact that he never mentioned to her that he had a son.  Oopsie. So the relationship is off-again, until he comes clean, then it's back on.  But there are more revelations to come, and Vincent's always been the one to walk away when things got difficult - at least he's trying to do better, but that's just who he is.  Can this relationship be saved after he neglected to mention his adult son, and the fact that his father once kidnapped a child from a wealthy family, and got sentenced to death for it? 

Supposedly, Vincent walked away from his marriage and abandoned his son for their own sake, so his son wouldn't have to grow up knowing about Vincent's father being executed, but who's to say whether Vincent's departure led, directly or indirectly, to Joey's current life as a Long Beach junkie?  It's all very tough to say - but either way, an uplifting film, this is not.  Joey struggles to get clean, he wants to fly away to Key West and get a job in a beach bar, but he's never quite able to do any of that. Vincent wants to prove his son's innocence (at least for the second murder, not the first one...) but can't seem to convince any of his fellow cops to look at the evidence that proves someone else killed the cop. And Michelle wants Vincent to be a better father and step up for once, not just walk away like he always does - but can that possibly happen? 

Reportedly, the director referred to his three years spent making "City by the Sea" as the worst and most depressing period of his career.  Bear in mind that this man later directed "Basic Instinct 2", so that's really saying something. 

Also starring Frances McDormand (last seen in "The French Dispatch"), James Franco (last seen in "Zeroville"), Eliza Dushku (last seen in "The New Guy"), William Forsythe (last seen in "Freedomland"), George Dzundza (last seen in "Salem's Lot"), Patti LuPone (last seen in "Last Christmas"), Anson Mount (last seen in "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness"), John Doman (last seen in "The Trial of the Chicago 7"), Brian Tarantina (last seen in "The Kitchen"), Drena De Niro (last seen in "Grace of My Heart"), Michael P. Moran, Nestor Serrano (last seen in "Definitely, Maybe"), Matthew Cowles (last seen in "Shutter Island"), Linda Emond (last seen in "The Unforgivable"), Cyrus Farmer, Jay Boryea, Leo Burmester (last seen in "Sweet Liberty"), Gregg Edelman (last seen in "Liberal Arts"), Jason Winther, Orlando Pabotoy, Leslie Cohen, Michelle Daimer, Stephi Lineburg, Mark La Mura (last seen in "The Wizard of Lies"), Jill Marie Lawrence (last seen in "Ocean's Eight"), Michael Della Femina.

RATING: 6 out of 10 bacon cheeseburgers from the drive-thru