A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints

What I enjoyed most about the movie was the interesting ways in which the director edited the film. It seemed that every 10 minutes or so, the viewer was treated to yet another new way to tell a story. The result was an often choppy pace, but it was done in a way that was very engaging and was easy to follow.

The acting was superb by all, and you felt genuine bonds between the unique characters. My only complaint here was that Robert Downey Jr. didn't seem to fit his part, though he acted well. It was a relatively minor role so didn't have an overall impact on the film.

I have never been to New York, but the movie was very insightful as to what it was like growing up there, both on the streets and at home.

An enjoyable movie that is fun to watch.

First time director Dito Montiel's "A Guide To Recognizing Your Saints" is a harsh autobiographical look back at his youth on the mean streets of Astoria, Queens in the mid 1980's. From the film's opening moments, Montiel introduces us to an intimate world of family and friendship that totally blindsided me by its greatness. There are moments in "A Guide To Recognizing Your Saints" that roll along with such force and emotion, that Montiel feels like a natural born filmmaker, infusing his personal heartache into strong characters breathing within a vivid time and place. Montiel's handling of edits, sound, and music are also powerful, such as a scene in Dito's kitchen between his father and group of friends that explodes into stark images and quick cuts to black. Montiel also handles the return home of Downey Jr. with care and vulnerability, searching for small answers that come in revelatory conversations with his mother (Dianne Weist) and grown up girlfriend Dianne (played by Rosario Dawson). And while such personal material can be hard to translate without lapsing into melancholy, Montiel finds a way to craft a clear eyed version of his life, allowing strong acting and electric film-making to take over the balance of the experience. I love finding unheralded gems such as this. The name of Robert Downey Jr. brought me to the theater and I discovered a true talent in Dito Montiel who has crafted one of the finest directing debuts in several years

I recently saw a screening of "A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints" without any prior knowledge of the subject matter or cast, which I am beginning to believe might be the best idea before seeing many of the smaller films out there. Reminiscent of "Goodfellas" and "Kids," a gritty coming-of-age story that packs a powerful punch with star Shia LaBeouf delivering a heart- breaking performance. This film is not to be missed and should be a strong contender come awards season. Director and writer Dito Montiel obviously draws from the likes of Martin Scorsese as he paints Queens, New York in a light only familiar to those who grew up deep in the heart of it. "Saints" elicits both tears and laughter, often within moments of each other while keeping the audience on the edge of their seats the entire time. Topping off this walk down memory lane, Montiel incorporates a stellar soundtrack mostly from the 70's, which feels right even though most of the story takes place in the mid 80's.

Despite how emotionally charged and rawly personal the film feels, I could not help but think cynically almost the entire time. Becoming annoyed with myself, I began to wonder why, and I realized that it was because it is only one person's movie and nobody else's: the writer/ director Dito Montiel's. It is a self-congratulating piece of self-indulgent work from a self- obsessed filmmaker. The whole movie basks in Montiel's comfort with projecting his story like another angry, organic indie film about growing up in a quasi-criminal, wild, crowded environment in New York City, constant music, a subjective camera, as if it were this generation's Mean Streets. But it is a painfully self-conscious movie. It goes for accent on structure of story and style rather than the story itself, as we are made to pity and root for people not through the story's workings but the emotional door-banging of the film itself.

Montiel's precious reminisce of a film is one triumphant paradox. I felt aggravated by its preoccupation with itself, but those feelings were undercurrents as I was truly enthralled with the film. I did care about certain characters and I felt like jumping up and saying, "Bravo," for the performances given by Robert Downey, Jr. and Rosario Dawson, despite his spare screen time, as well as Shia LeBeouf, Chazz Palminteri, and Dianne Wiest. Montiel succeeds in ending the film in a way where we're shaking the residual effect for the rest of the day, and I'm not doubting that he has talent. If he'd realize that his compulsion with drawing attention to what kind of movie it is and how it is made is actually an obstruction in the way of his story, perhaps the way he wants his film to appear will happen more naturally.

An authentically heartfelt, and truly inspiring film, by a first-time filmmaker, Recognizing Your Saints, bellows deep in the heart and soul of everyone that is privileged to see it. Written and directed by Dito Montiel, from his autobiographical novel of the same title, Recognizing Your Saints is a sincerely brave effort, by a shy and yet outspoken filmmaker. Rehashing his hellish childhood in 1980's Astoria, Queens, Montiel brings a brilliant cast together to portray the misery of the youth growing up around him at the time.

Starring Robert Downey Jr. as the adult version of Montiel and Shia LaBeouf as the angst teenager, there is an almost perfect synergy between the two portrayals of Montiel at two different spectrum's of his life. Being called back to a Queens that Montiel left with his life and the clothes on his back, he is called back to take his dying father to the hospital.

Questions of fatherly love and compassion are brought out throughout the film, only to be answered by the gently grim, unyielding hand of Montiel's father played by native New Yorker, Chaz Palmintieri. Comparisons to Mean Streets, Kids and Raising Victor Vargas can be made to this New York drama on the whole. But, every scene, individually is so undeniably real that Montiel's film surpasses its comparisons and resonates as an entirely different type of film.

This film, about a group of kids can be told anywhere and that is what is unique about it, that it does not limit itself to the city it subsequently takes place on. It was a great surprise after the screening of the film, to have a nice personal Q & A, with the director himself. Being a very shy man, Montiel answered a few questions about the characters in the film, and where they are now. He also explained how much he loved working with the young cast, and breaking the rules of film making, he did not know existed. Overall this is a great film, filled with amazing performances, no one should miss.