In my sophomore outing as an amateur film critic, we decided to tackle “City by the Sea,” the latest offering from Warner Brothers Studios and venerable star Robert De Niro. “City by the Sea” focuses on the ongoing family saga of Detective Vincent La Marca (De Niro) and his troubled son Joey (James Franco). Plagued by memories of his father’s criminal past and subsequent execution, La Marca watches helplessly as Joey slides deeper and deeper into a hole of vagrancy and drug addiction.
Complicating matters, La Marca is faced with an ugly drug-related murder case in which Joey seems to be the prime suspect, another family tragedy looming on the horizon.
“City by the Sea” stands as proof that familiarity doesn’t always breed contempt. A familiar plot coupled with one of America’s most familiar leading men may seem a pretty dull combination, but the film escapes total mediocrity because of strong performances and a compelling setting.
De Niro carries the film on his shoulders and manages to elevate it to a higher level of believability with his passionate and finely-modulated turn as Vince La Marca. We’ve all seen De Niro countless times before, and we know what to expect from him.
This time, it is what De Niro is working at underneath the surface of his character that keeps us watching. Stripping away the usual De Niro mannerisms and speaking patterns, however, reveals a tangible core of pain and fear. It’s a powerful performance that begs for a showcase in a better film.
The movie’s best moments come in the quiet conversational scenes between De Niro and Frances McDormand, excellent in a secondary role as La Marca’s easy-going love interest. McDormand is perhaps one of the smartest and most interesting actresses in film today, and she makes the most of her limited screen time with our leading man. The two screen veterans work very well together, adding depth and truth to dialogue that may have fallen flat in the hands of lesser actors.
Filling out the cast with able support are James Franco (Harry Osborn to all you “Spider-Man” fanatics) as Joey, George Dzunda as La Marca’s amiable partner Reg, and Patti LuPone as La Marca’s brittle ex-wife Maggie. Less successful are Eliza Dushku (almost always underwhelming, in my opinion) as Joey’s long-suffering girlfriend and William Forsythe as a ruthless, motorcycle-riding drug dealer.
While Dushku simply fails to register much with her material, Forsythe cuts a cartoonish figure of evil which seems imported from a different (and far sillier) movie altogether.
Making the most of Ken Hixon’s uninventive screenplay, Michael Caton-Jones (director of the vastly superior “Rob Roy” and “This Boy’s Life”) keeps the ball rolling fairly efficiently from beginning to end. Together with cinematographer Karl Walter Lindenlaub, Caton-Jones creates a wonderful sense of heaviness and dread in all of the New York locations important to the story, from bustling Broadway to ghostly Long Beach.
The setting and plot themes are compelling, but the film never completely overcomes the constraints of an unmemorable script.
I’m giving this one a slight recommendation, however, because of the fine performances of De Niro and McDormand, who even seem to make familiarity new and exciting. Catch it or don’t. It’s your six bucks.