Moscow on the Hudson

Robin Williams is excellent as a Russian circus performer in New York City with his troupe for the first time, deciding to defect and become a U.S. citizen. After an appropriately dark, though somewhat heavy-handed opening, this comedy-drama from director Paul Mazursky suddenly finds its niche and seldom wavers. It may appear from the early parts of the picture that Williams is giving yet another of his overly-colorful, cartoonish performances, but he too gets into the groove of this project and fleshes out this charming, confounding, complicated man. Maria Conchita Alonso is wonderful as the working girl who falls for Williams (they have terrific chemistry, and Alonso has never been better). A fuzzy, friendly, thoughtful film, a bit too long but occasionally sublime. *** from ****

Manhattan looks so much more varied and gritty and real and less mall-ified than it does today in this, Paul Mazursky's 1984 love letter to the American way, and one of the last unambiguously patriotic mainstream American movies. (It's very much a product of its Reagan time, right down to the casual homophobia.) Robin Williams, for once not twinkling too hard or overworking his virtuosity or adorableness, is an Everyman Russian who unexpectedly defects in Bloomingdale's and goes on to live the immigrant experience, suffering urban indignities and romantic angst along the way. His worklife is a little easier, his economic situation a little less treacherous, and the people he meets a little nicer than they would be in real life. For all that, in its celebration of the melting pot and its warm embrace of the American urban landscape, the movie moved me to tears.

Robin Williams truly shows his amazing acting skills in this film. This movie is more of a drama than a comedy which is to be expected when you hear the plot of the story. Williams's Russian is quite convincing and the over all acting from the cast must be a 10 out of 10. It is easy to feel for Vladimir and the journey brings you along. The accuracy is stunning for those who lived through those kinds of situations. Vladimir finds that life is not perfect anywhere but he is sure happy to live in the land of opportunity, the land that gave him `Freedom'.

My main reason for checking this movie out was because of Robin Williams. After seeing him in so many great films like "Insomnia" and "One Hour Photo" and watching his numerous hilarious talk show appearances, I've become even more curious about checking out the movies on his filmography that I have yet to see. Well, this is more than just a Robin Williams vehicle. Paul Mazursky cleverly combines comedy and drama, and expresses some good morals. He accurately portrays an immigrant's journey to America, and how he/she expects that America is a beautiful place where everyone can run free without any set limitations. It starts out as a fish-out-of-water comedy in which Russian immigrant Williams (who decides he wants to become an American citizen) explores the oddities of New York City and revels in its ambience, no matter how rough the neighborhoods are, no matter how many wackos are running around. Then he slowly learns that freedom has a price. America may be a free country, but that doesn't stop him from getting mugged and having his upstairs neighbors constantly complain about him playing his saxophone.

One thing that impressed me was rather than have a bunch of American actors don Russian accents, Mazursky actually has the actors speaking Russian to each other. Now, there are certain movies like "Schindler's List" and "K-19: The Widowmaker" in which we do see American actors speaking English and putting on foreign accents and still prove to be good movies, but it's always more engaging to see characters from a certain country speaking their native language. I mean, what if Russia were to make a movie set in America, where all the American characters were speaking Russian in American accents? How goofy would that look? I'm guessing that Williams was the only American actor in the cast, and the rest are actual Russians. I don't speak Russian, so I can't tell whether or not Williams was actually speaking Russian, but it looked convincing to me. But since mainstream American audiences have grown to hate reading subtitles, you probably won't see a movie like this released nationwide.

Robin Williams gives a terrific performance, totally disappearing into character. I was actually convinced he was a foreigner, as he speaks just like a Russian immigrant, in broken English, not articulating his words one bit. There was no sign of Robin Williams the Comedian in his character. Whenever he gets a laugh, he gets a laugh as Vladimir and not as Robin. Besides, this is one of his more serious roles and he never really plays it for laughs. Maria Conchita Alonso still sounds Cuban, as her Italian character, but she still gives a fine performance. Since I haven't seen her in any recent movies, it's nice to see her pretty face again. She was like the Salma Hayek of the 80's. Williams and Alonso have a good on-screen chemistry.

The friendship between Williams and his African-American friend, who goes as far as letting him move in with his family, is very touching. Working as a security guard at Bloomingdale's and seeing Williams wreaking havoc around the store, he starts out hating his guts. Before you know it, they're best buddies. The most touching scene is the one in which Williams leaves a jazz club, depressed after being told by a well-known jazz musician that he needs practice. He decides to throw his saxophone away and forget about being a musician altogether. His friend relates to his problem and gives him plenty of encouragement in pursuing his dream of playing the saxophone, as they get drunk and laugh their heads off. The movie stresses the outburst of immigrants in New York City, which is a melting pot society. Almost every character Williams comes in contact with is either a foreigner or a minority. Strange but undoubtedly true, if you were to examine the streets of New York. It's not unlikely to walk across a whole city block, where not one person speaks English.

The movie has no real plot structure, as it is mainly character-driven. The comedy is subtle, and arises naturally. My favorite quote from the film is when Williams says, "I bought my first pair of American shoes. They were made in Italy." That is a sample of the kind of humor in this film. I definitely suggest people check out this oldie-but-a-goodie.

My score: 7 (out of 10)

Robin Williams became famous, I think, for his stand-up comedy, like his idol Jonathan Winters, but do you realize how many movies this guy has made over the years? He's really become quite a film star and is especially good playing against-type as a criminal or simply as a wacko (see "One Hour Photo?")

Anway, this was an early Robin Williams film in which he plays a Russian musician defecting to the United States. He ("Vladamir Ivanoff") first hides out in a big store in New York City before being taken in as an immigrant by a black guy (can you say PC?) Williams does an outstanding job speaking Russian, by the way, as opposed to most English-speaking actors.

There really isn't much of a plot here, just slices of life, if you will, some of it with the usual Liberal promiscuous (i.e. "I'm a liberated woman and if I stay the night, don't misinterpret that I want to get involved with you," the Italian tells the Russian. I can think of a few more accurate descriptions that the word "liberated.")

All in all, despite the premise and talents of Williams, this was only so-so. It kind of runs out of steam halfway through and it's hard to maintain interest in the final 40 percent of it. Actually, I like Williams better when he plays more serious roles like this although I'm not sure if he himself was ready to play it straight this early in his career. He's just too tempted in this film to produce comedy. He's a talented and very strange guy; this film reflects that.