Entre Amigos

Released in 1991, this movie captures a quality New York possessed in the late eighties. The characters seem genuinely capable of making the wisecracks the script has them make. They're middle-class urbanites who are capable of desperate violence. Yet, they are not particularly violent. They are haunted by the hardscrabble lives of their parents. The story involves a group of people in their early-to-mid-thirties. They've known each other since childhood. The plot is this: Will the scheduled marriage between two members of this group actually take place? While he is not the lead actor here, John Malkovich plays a character who embodies the dilemma each one of the characters faces. Each one wishes he were somewhere else and yet each one would give his right arm for anybody else in this circle of friends. Unlike his friends, he is gay, but what he has in common with them is the sense that the upper-class will have nothing to do with him. He is dating an upwardly-mobile man and his confrontation with him is still refreshing thirteen years after this movie was filmed. Many movies and TV series have dealt with this milieu, but very few have pulled it off. It is not entirely believable--there's an over-the-top story-line with Jamie Lee Curtis as a smooth-talker who enchants the edgy Joe Mantegna--but it's assertive. QUEENS LOGIC is well worth viewing.

Sentimental, nostalgic and supposedly authentic portray of some people and their relations with great music (Joe Jackson et al.) around a wedding under Hellgate Bridge in Queens. Anger, frustration and ideals reach the surface as we get to know these figures. One of them gives the advice: 'Wanna be happy for the rest of your life? Fall in love with your wife.' Probably the best advice a young man whose dreams don't come together can get.

Tom Waits was two years later in Altman's 'Short Cuts' that also deals with several relationships and has no plot. Short Cuts however is more solid and intelligent. This movie is not exceptional in any way, but I've seen it three times already because I think it's a nice movie with good acting about a day in the lives of some young people and that makes me feel good.

The chosen music tells about half of the story. That's a very good choice of director Rash, especially since there is no real plot. SO, if you're a person who needs a plot, then don't watch this movie. In that case try 'Chinatown' instead, or 'the Maltese Falcon'. Or kick in another open door :)

I don't understand why so few people like this film. But then again I also liked Jade (Friedkin, 1995) and Last Seduction (Dahl, 1994): plotfilms with suspense. Maybe it's just because I like common denominator Linda Fiorentino very much. There is no challenging intellectual material in Queens Logic.

8/10

After watching Dogma for the umpteenth time on Comedy Central, I became a Linda Fiorentino fan along with others out there who wondered what happened to this promising actress since 2002. I have seen other films. This one shows that she can play a desperate housewife who can be both strong and vulnerable to her husband played by Joe Mantegna. Jamie Lee Curtis is underused in this role. Fiorentino and Chloe Webb's characters form a believable friendship on screen that I wonder why Linda hasn't worked in five years is a mystery to me. Anyway, it's an all star cast featuring besides Webb, Mantegna, and Fiorentino but also Kevin Bacon, Ken Olin, John Malkovich, and Jamie Lee Curtis. The storyline needs some work. I loved the scene where Carla steals the guys' clothes while they are skinny dipping in a pool. The movie is about a reunion of friends who get together for a wedding that may or may not happen anyway. I plead that Linda gets work soon again because she is really one of the best actresses out there playing strong women rather than weak and superficial.

I never really had any true friends when I was growing up (I was weird, okay), but I know that the best friends are the ones who stay around. "Queens Logic", an under-looked , sleeper indie film (unless you look really hard in the discount DVD bins) starring a name cast, proves that in the largest borough of New York City.

Wedding jitters plague Ray (Ken Olin of "thirtysomething" and a producer of "Alias"), since he's a talented painter born and residing in Queens, and is about to marry longtime sweetheart Patty (Chloe Webb) a hairdresser with a philosophical outlook. His other pals from childhood, fish marketer cousin Al (the talented Joe Mantegna of "Criminal Minds"), Al's right-hand man Eliot (John Malkovich of "Changeling"), visiting musician Dennis (Kevin Bacon) and working actor Vin (Tony Spiridakis, who co-wrote the film with Joey Savino) help him out by throwing a decent bachelor's party (men and women invited), but they each have their problems.

Despite his jester charm, Al's Peter Pan persona irritates his frustrated wife Carla (the sexy Linda Fiorentino); Eliot's a homosexual who has no desire to play "the love game"; Dennis's still struggling on making it big in Los Angeles and Vin gets one-night stands but no romance. Adulthood: IT SUCKS! But not this film.

Director Steve Rash ("The Buddy Holly Story", "Can't Buy Me Love" and the two DTV sequels to "Bring It On") is competent, but the actors help out more, pumping the tale with humanity, especially Mantegna's breezy, arrested development demeanor, Malkovich's non-stereotypical attitude and Webb's down to earth perspective. Also entertaining is Jamie Lee Curtis as a high society dame, who gives Al a lesson about maturity in a colorful way, and rocker Tom Waits as a gravel-voiced but likable lowlife associate of the gang. Look for a pre- "Will & Grace" Megan Mullany as a drunken conquest of Vin's. The film's soundtrack is littered with rock and disco tunes from the 1970s, the decade the guys grew up.

Likable, poignant, sly, funny and a love letter to its' backdrop (Queens's Hellgate Bridge is prominent here), "Queens Logic" reminds us, despite how we grow up or wherever we are in our lives, the neighborhood we grew up is part of us and vice versa, and the best friends we have reminds us of that.

Queens Logic is an excellently written film about a bunch of late thirty somethings who are still trying to figure out how to get their act together. I worry that this film is only going to be accepted locally (i.e. New York, Long Island target audience) when it really has a multitude of universal levels to it. The acting was brilliant--absolutely brilliant, from Kevin Bacon to Linda Fiorentino, Joe Mantegna and John Malkevich. The actors really understood these complex characters (Malkevich is SO good once again it's scary). And the writing and direction could not have been better for these roles. Congratulations for writing a script with so many thoughtful, intelligent and original characters which reflect so well on the time and all of our struggles to figure out what it is that makes us happy--and to do it so humorously as well. This is one of those rare very smart and very funny films. Like I said though, people who are not necessarily from the New York area may not buy or believe these characters, but I guarantee you there are so many people like them. Guarantee it. They're great people with same problems as everyone else. They just choose to deal with them on their own terms and in the best format they know how: with Queens logic.