Les chaînes du sang

First I have to say that the novel Bloodbrothers by Richard Price is one of my alltime favorite books. Usually Hollywood has to make changes to make a movie viable , but in this one changing the book's ending kind of negated the novel's point. This is about a blue collar Bronx family with a long line of tradition as construction workers. Richard Gere in one of his first leading roles plays the sensitive older son who wants to work with children. His macho father, well played by Tony Lo Bianco, pressures him to work construction.Lo Bianco's tyrant character has made his whole family miserable, yet he is never played as a stereotype. The entire cast is good but at times it plays like a blue collar soap opera. If you haven't read the book, the film's highly charged emotions may hit home.

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Robert Mulligan is a director who can sometimes serve up a masterpiece and sometimes a megabomb. Take To Kill A Mockingbird, for example, an undisputed classic which would appear on most top 100 lists. Then compare it to The Stalking Moon, a 1968 western which is as boring as it is heavy-handed. In Bloodbrothers, Mulligan has managed to be inconsistent within one movie - aspects of his family drama are pretty good, other parts are downright dull.

Young New Yorker Stony De Coco (Richard Gere) is approaching his 20s and is at the junction of life where he must decide where his future lies. His aggressive, misogynistic father Tommy (Tony LoBianco) expects him to follow in the family tradition of becoming an electrician on construction sites, but Stony feels he has a better aptitude for working with children. He gets a job looking after kids at a city hospital, and finds plenty of rewards in the job, but Tommy applies increasing pressure on him to look for a more "macho", manly job.

Stony's dilemma is quite interesting, and the role is played pretty well by a young, impressive Gere. Tommy is also a strongly-written character, memorably fleshed-out by the reliable and ever-underrated LoBianco. In fact, on the performance front the film is somewhat impressive all the way down the cast. The faults in Bloodbrothers lie elsewhere. Walter Newman's script (arguably the least worthy screenplay ever to receive an Oscar nomination) makes too many unforgivable changes to its source novel; the pacing is less than ideal (the film is halfway through before it becomes apparent where the story is really going); and the broader social and personal issues in the story are never satisfactorily developed. As an acting showcase, this is good stuff but as an overall film it's not so good. There's certainly no reason why you shouldn't give it a go, but it's doubtful that this will ever be a film you want to watch over and over again.

I just watch Bloodbrothers for the first time and I was quite impressed that the individual stories of each of the six (6) De Coco family members struck me as very real and heart felt. The two (2) senior middle aged De Coco male family members brothers Tommy (Tony Lo Bianco) and Chubby (Paul Sorvino) were especially well acted.

Tommy DeCoco's family is comprised of his troubled and mentally unstable wife Phyllis (Yvonne Wilder), and their two sons, ten (10) year old Albert (Michael Hershewe) who lives in fear of his mother's continued insistance that Albert is too thin and must eat more, and their adult 22 year old son Stony (Richard Gere) who is on the cusp of making the biggest decision in his young life, which is his chosen career path. Stony's father Tommy wants his son Stony to follow in his Italian heritage work path which is in construction, but what Stony really wants to do is to work with young children, most likely as an extension of the love and care he outwardly provides continually to his younger and troubled little brother Albert.

Tommy's brother Chubby, (Paul Sorvino) is filled with life and much love for his brother Tommy's entire family. In a very sombre moment in the middle of the film Chubby shares with the local wheelchair bound barkeeper Banion (Kenneth McMillan) why him and his wife do not have any children of their own and why Chubby is so deeply attached to his brother Tommy's two (2) children.

There are also strong supporting roles by actors Yvonne Wilder, Kenneth McMillan, Kristen DeBell, Floyd Levine, and Marilu Henner. The interaction between Richard Gere and Marilu Henner helped both actors lead very succesful subsequent film careere.s Although the film runs for less than two (2) hours in length there is a lifetime of memories to capture our attention. Two such memorable examples are the birthday celebration of barkeeper Banion, and the family trip by car that everyone has to wear their Sunday best for as Tommy and Chubby surprise their respective families with what they have purchased for their families future use.

This is a film that is a classic and is worthy of a much higher IMDB rating. Maybe some families just cannot face reality, I for one embrace both the love and hardship almost all blue collar families are confronted with in our daily lives.

I give Bloodbrothers a most deserving 9 out of 10 rating

Kim Milford, the greatest actor of the latter half of the 20th century, and all around American icon turns in the most under rated performance of his career. Milford, star of the classic Sci Fi film "LASERBLAST" is not held down by the weaknesses of co-star Richard Gere. In fact, the brilliance of Milford's artistry is elevated by the fact that no other actor in the film can match him.

This is an unfair criticism of Gere, since the only actor of Milford's caliber is the legendary Michael Tedesco, who's portrayal of such characters as Jellyroll and Tbob elevate him to the same level as Milford.

One must wonder how this film would have turned out if Milford was not cast. Milford, who would also be burdened with Mark Hammill in Corvette Summer has shown a long tradition of carrying films to greatness that would otherwise be destined for failure.

The De Cocos are a rambunctious bunch. They're working class Bronx family. Louis "Chubby" De Coco (Paul Sorvino) is the protective uncle. Thomas "Stony" De Coco (Richard Gere) is the more sensitive one. Everybody yells. The younger son can't eat. Stony takes a recreational assistant job at a children's hospital ward and turns down his father (Tony Lo Bianco)'s coveted union construction job.

The acting is very broad. The characters are strangely wild like the son who wouldn't eat and his mother having a fit. It's an over-the-top stereotypical portrayal of an Italian-American family. It's not quirky in a funny way. It's like everybody is trying to be in a Streetcar Named Desire. In that way, Richard Gere shows that he has the screen presence to compete against more veteran actors like Sorvino and Bianco. It also has Marilu Henner at the same time as she starts her Taxi run. Sorvino is pushing for acting accolades if only he didn't whip that chain around.