A Magnificent Movie

I saw this one in the theaters when it released oh so many years ago, but just had the opportunity to see it again for the first time in 25 years.

I've long considered Levinson a favorite director, what with a handful of truly great movies ("Diner," "The Natural", "Good Morning, Vietnam", "Rain Man" "Wag the Dog") some very good ones ("Bugsy", "Tin Men", "Young Sherlock Holmes"), some strange but interesting ones ("Toys"), and some puzzling misfires ("Man of the Year", "What Just Happened", "Bandits"). Judging by the trailer, the upcoming "Rock the Kasbah" looks like it might go into that last category, however.

If I were to assign to him a masterpiece film, though, it is the vastly under-appreciated "Avalon."

His precise and beautiful documentation of the immigrant experience in America, both as the new land provides possibilities while it also provides the setting for the slow disintegration of the family is as poetic as it is hauntingly beautiful.

Each generation succeeding more financially but losing touch with one another, TV is the metaphorical tool of the family's isolation from each other. From how the new, novel TV was brought in so that Jules could help heal and the family was captivated by the test pattern to the cousins (renamed "Kaye" and "Kirk") selling nothing but TVs and jumping in on TV advertising, to the TV placed in every living room gradually transitioning from background to foreground to Jules finally becoming an advertising sales professional.

I believe after "The Music Box" this was Armin Mueller-Stahl's second American movie and he just owns it through and through. Next is Aidan Quinn as Jules Kaye, who gives one of those kind of performances that makes you shake your head and despair that he never became quite the star he deserved to be.

I suspect many people could find such similar stories within their own families as they immigrated to America in the early 20th Century.