3 Backyards

... but, obviously, not everyone's.

If you appreciate excellent acting, beautiful cinematography and don't need to be spoon-fed a message or hung up on plot, this may be a film for you.

It is daringly ambitious in that the dialog is almost non-existent, leaving the entire weight of the film in the hands of the actors and the camera and the soundtrack — and, of course, the director. All succeed marvelously as three day-in-a-life stories are laid out, each with nervous overtones and unique tension.

Searching for a unifying theme is a Rorschach test; you will make of it what you will. The inability of people to communicate on a personal level — or any level at all, for that matter — can lead to all sorts of unintended consequences, as you will see. I thought Edie Falco's acting was a bit blunt, but Elias Koteas's performance is marvelous. Embeth Davidtz conveys the most amount of mystery with the fewest amount of words — acting at its finest.

It is a wonderfully modern, realistic film, with the majority of the spoken words coming over a phone and conclusions largely unresolved. Still, I was engaged for every one of its 88 minutes. It's been a long time since a film held me so tightly.

Of the 2 rating - one is for Edie Falco, who plays the only character that has any (in this film) and whose vulnerability isn't accompanied by a musical score that is reminiscence of Psycho and/or the Perils of Pauline! I liked the neighbor, too. (Note to Edie - You should have tossed her a-- out of the car.)

The other is for the beautiful images and photography,in this indulgent waste of time.

The rest of the characters were mere contrived vehicles for emotional manipulation and senseless studies in unrealistic settings. NIMBY!

I resented being taken for such a ride, but what really infuriates me, are self-impressed reviewers who have the "magic" to see into the true and deeper meaning of the film and rave about it. Yuck!

I found this beautifully crafted movie a welcome relief from most of what's out there these days, both from big Hollywood blockbusters and pretentious, shticky indie films.

I was amazed at the depth and power of these very small stories. For me, it's all about the power of film working on every level, like a perfectly orchestrated piece of art. I thought about it for days after seeing it.

There is just something so haunting and beautiful about 3 Backyards, like a poem or a short story. And technically it's just a wonder. The word "impeccable" keeps coming to mind: impeccably acted, impeccably shot, impeccably scored, impeccably directed.

It's a very grownup, sophisticated movie. It reminded me a lot of a 70s movie.

Definitely one of my favorites of the last few years. I hope it gets seen beyond New York City.

So... no prizes for guessing that '3 Backyards' did indeed also bore me to tears too. The contrasting reviews here are interesting: there are those which praise the gentle tones and sensitive depictions etc. of real 'non-Hollywood' life. And then, there are those reviews which most artfully hit the nail on its proverbial head: the movie is boring, self indulgent, and stretches the limits of one's concentration span just to get from scene to scene - never mind to the movie's end! While watching this movie, I was reminded of sitting at a table in a restaurant which is sited inches too near to the next table, while my infinitely more interesting companion is late. Thus, I must be forced for a certain period to listen to the most gruesomely banal conversation, leaking from the suited bores beside me; that is to say, people who couldn't string one original idea together - if their very lives depended on doing so. Alas, the screenplay writer from this movie must've learned much from folk none too dissimilar to those nondescript inanities, sitting beside me then - because this movie lacks even half of a moment's worth of brilliance.

A miserably boring, exercise in futility. "2/10", is its true rating, this reviewer declares, and not "1/10" - solely because the production and acting were not at all bad. Watch this movie if you must, and if only to know how an arty movie can also fail to engage its audience. Gladly, I very much know that not all Art movies are as boring as 3 Backyards, for I'm no 'Trashformers' fan!

From the writer and director Eric Mendolsohn whose only other film is one of my favorite movies of the last 10yrs or so(Judy Berlin) comes this humble charmer of a film, '3 Backyards'. Here we have in the span of a single day in a mildly upper class neighborhood on a bay in Long Island, three stories unfolding at the same time but that never directly touch each other. The movie is beautiful, humble, small-scaled, well acted, and refreshing. Though it may be disceptably simple, it never deceives; the moving camera being just as intrusive as we want it to be as it floats in on the scene, the characters or the clouds or the leaves on a tree, the somewhat old fashioned dissolves used liberally yet tastefully. Three little gems; three little peeks into the lives of these folks on this particular day. My only complaint, if you can call it that, is that at an hour and a half, the movie ends too soon. I wish it could have kept on and on. One story is about a man (played by Elias Koteas) having marriage problems who when his business trip gets cancelled last minute, instead of returning home, hangs out near the airport hotel and begins to follow a mysterious woman One is about a little girl who on her way to school loses an expensive bracelet of her mother's and who must retrieve it from a seemingly dangerous backyard before she can return home. The third story concerns a lady (played by Edie Falco) who is given the honor(much to the envy of her neighbor) of driving a local, semi-famous movie actress to the waiting ferry. We go back and forth between each tale seamlessly and by the end, though the characters do not literally ever interact, there is some heart-pumping, unnameably agreeable cohesion to it all. Now that I realize this sounds awfully similar to a mundane movie review, I will stop and simply encourage anyone so inclined to go see it. It's playing now at Cinema Village on 12th st. near Union Square.