TIFF Report: Romance and Cigarettes Review

Ah, John Turturro. His presence is a nearly certain sign of quality and when he appears on the credits along side the Coen Brothers good things are sure to happen. Yes, the Coen's serve only as excutive producers (i.e. money men) on this one and Turturro works purely behind the camera as writer / director / producer but the principal holds. Turturro's third directorial effort sports a bit of a split personality but when this film is on - which it most often is - it is ON. Sporting an all star cast Romance and Cigarettes is the sotry of a dissolving marriage told as a musical, a comic musical no less, in Brooklyn.

James Gandolfini stars as Nick Murder, a high altitude steel worker, the husband of Kitty (Susan Sarandon), father of three daughters, and lover of the incredibly vulgar oversexed lingerie sales girl Tula (Kate Winslet). Steve Buscemi turns up as Murder's best friend, Christopher Walken as Kitty's cousin Bo, Eddie Izzard as a church organist ... you get the idea. The cast is brilliant, and Turturro uses them well.

The story gets rolling when Kitty discovers a ludicrously bad, and quite sexually explicit, love poem written by Nick for Tula. She lays in to her husband who denies anything is happening, a full on screaming match breaks out, and Nick is thrown out of the house. Now there have been a couple of little fantasy fluorishes already by this point, little shots of Nick lusting after Tula on his drive home, but everything has been played pretty straight. This ends the second Nick steps out of his front door and launches into a full on song and dance number accompanied by the neighborhood men, garbage collectors and electrical workers.

Now, think about this. We're talking about James Galdofini here, not a delicate man by any means, launching in to 'Lonely Is A Man Without Love' accompanied by garbagemen in a resolutely blue collar part of New York. See the disconnect? Turturro certainly does and he works it for all it is worth amping up the ridiculousness of the situation by making his dance number roughly what would happen if real New York garbagemen actually tried to do this. It is outrageously funny and Turturro mines this deep well of absurdity again and again without it ever once threatening to run dry ... we get Aretha Franklin belted out in church, Tom Jones in a crowded tenement block - by Christopher Walken no less - and a slew of other soul and classic pop songs. Playing with the genre even further Turturro frequently works song lyrics into his spoken lines as well.

The musical section carries through roughly the first two acts of the film - the Romance part of the title - before taking on a much more serious tone in the final act, the Cigarettes part, in which Turturro looks at what happens when a very real tragedy strikes the Murder family. After laying on the laughs thick and fast Turturro wants to make these characters real people as well and while the tonal shift is fairly abrupt his actors are strong enough to pull it off.

The film has some problems coming together narratively - particularly in the early going - but the first two acts are so severely quotable, so full of hysterical set pieces and goofy energy - the cast is clearly having a blast with this - that it is very easy to forgive any flaws. How funny is this film? How strong the cast? So strong that Turturro is able to take Eddie Izzard - one of the funniest men on the planet - and put him in a purely serious role. Galdolfini and Sarandon are both solid in the early going but clearly intended more for the later dramatic work, the real stars of the musical section are Kate Winslet, Christopher Walken and Bobby Cannavale.

Cannavale plays the fiance of Murder's youngest daughter (Mandy Moore). A wildly over flamboyant young man seemingly stuck in the disco era he insists on being referred to as Fryburg, talks complete nonsense, and considers himself a budding rock star. The make out session - one of the parts of the film featuring song lyrics delivered as oh-so-serious dialog - between Cannavale and Moore is one of the best things I've seen in ages and the entire audience just collapsed when Moore turned to Cannavale and declared that he was the 'best kisser ever'. Christopher Walken plays Kitty's Elvis and Buddy Holly obsessed florist cousin who rushes to her aid to exact revenge on Tula. Walken is an absolute madman in this film, completely unhinged and hysterically funny every time he opens his mouth. And Winslet ... well, if you've seen her guest spot on Ricky Gervais' Extras you know she can be fantastically dirty and fantastic while doing so and her Extras bit has got nothing on this. She is one dirty, dirty girl with a mouth constantly streaming sexual innuendo. It is way against type for Winslet and she obviously love the chance to burst her own bubble. And I haven't even gotten into Buscemi's take on gender politics ...

Romance and Cigarettes is not a perfect film, not by a long shot, but it is massively entertaining. Turturro aims to take his audience on a ride and he does just that. Definitely one to watch for when it hits wide release.