The Deli

A messy movie with the occasional unnecessary scene that gos nowhere and appears to have nothing to do with the plot. One of the most annoying films I have seen in years. I guffawed once so I guess it gets one star. Truly arduous viewing!

Not very much happens in this slice-of-life story about the people who work in and frequent a neighborhood deli. Most of the dialogue seems improvised, which isn't always such a good thing. There was a laugh or two but not enough to sustain interest throughout. Matt Keeslar is good and gets special credit for not even attempting a dese-dem-dose accent. The characters that come in and out of the story are sometimes interesting and colorful, but they add up to not very much. It is always nice seeing some good actors, like Chris Noth, Frank Vincent, Debi Mazar, William McNamara, Ice T and especially David Johanssen, who is perhaps funniest of all as a cabbie.

ok.. this isn't your average comedy.. it's quite fun to watch, but don't expect to fall down on your back or laugh out a storm! it's good, the performance is very good actually. I personally enjoyed this movie! It's a smart sort of a comedy, I think that the whole family can enjoy this one!

An A Class Cast in a B Class Movie. The Deli tries to be like Clerks or Smoke and fails. For starters, half this movie is just for laughs. No real story, no plot or moral, just a laugh or two. The other half is decent, with good acting, a good storyline, etc. If they had to do it all over again, they should edit 45 minutes of the movie and made it into a short film. That way, the Deli could have won awards for a 3mm short comedy. Instead, the Deli is a straight to video release with an amazing Italian cast and a terrible story. PS....does anybody relate, if not care about the main characters? Gamblers without any shame of destroying their lives in order to win on a basketball game. It's one thing to write a comedy, but the ending makes the audience lose interest in any of the characters and treat the Deli like a "half-baked" comedy...with a great cast of actors.

All through "The Deli", a movie centered around a New York City deli and its gambling-addict owner through the course of a weekend, the film shakes the audience by the shoulders again and again and shouts with the desperation of a drug addict in need of a fix (or a filmmaker in need of a positive buzz for his project)"I'm a quirky independent film with even quirkier independent-film-characters, I swear!!" Plot be damned! Scenes in "The Deli" are set up again and again to showcase the whacky ensemble cast of semi-familiar names playing loser-like, yet sometimes endearing characters that must inhabit the middle class neighborhoods of New York City's outer boroughs like locusts: one prime example is a scene involving a slimy Italian couple with over-the-top Brooklyn accents in a shouting match over some insipid topic as their stepdaughter dances around yelling with them, with rapper Ice T between them. The scene ends with Ice T stamping his foot in frustration and shouting with mighty gusto: "Damn! This place be crazier than my own hood!" Ha-ha. Boy, quirky independent films don't get any quirkier than this. Mike Starr, after a career of second-fiddle-at-best roles as the big, beefy working class guy with the big New York accent, finally lands a lead, and now he most likely never will again. Quentin Tarantino spawned a horrble plague on us all, and it is that of the bratty independant filmmaker who thinks Tarantino is successful only because he made "Reservoir Dogs" first. As a lifelong New York City resident, I've seen this breed of artists (and I use the term quite loosely) flock to Manhattan's trendier districts to jumpstart their careers, and the few who do just that, usually make B-Grade films like "The Deli", and paint their canvas with colorful New York characters who are mere figments in their imagination of what real New Yorkers must be like. I can't say it's all that insulting, at least when it's a mediorce quality film like this one, but it sure gets tiring after awhile, and makes one long for the days when Tarantino was still a waiter, and his army of wanna-bes still in Anytown, USA.