City Island 2009

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: Writer-director Raymond De Felitta has cut together a frustrating comedy, with the misunderstandings piling up like kindling for a bonfire that his movie never lights. Read more

A.O. Scott, At the Movies: I was won over by this movie's affectionate, silly spirit. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, Time Out: The complications have the appeal of a classic farce, and if the movie's humor requires a suspension of disbelief, the actors are terrific, and there's much pleasure in watching the way the drama redoubles and resolves. Read more

Ted Fry, Seattle Times: In spite of an overly elaborate series of mix-ups that are revealed in a paroxysm of absurdity in the final scene, the movie has a genuine heart and a delicate earnestness that is as amusing as it is affectionate. Read more

Jonathan F. Richards, Film.com: This is the kind of movie that could easily sink into comedy hijinks as broad and flat as pappardelle. But it doesn't. De Felitta... makes no apologies for the outrageousness of the coincidences and gloriously knotty relationships and secrets. Read more

Sam Adams, AV Club: The movie too often equates drama with volume, and agita with authenticity. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: A funny, heartfelt look at families, relationships and the lies that prop them up as much as tear them down. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: The movie's comic machinery never stops clanking long enough for us to relax and genuinely enjoy the silliness. But the actors are enjoying themselves, and that goes a very long way. Read more

Cliff Doerksen, Chicago Reader: Feeble but well-stuffed comedy. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: City Island scrapes by and delivers a smile or two because it does contain a fundamental understanding of the rot that sets in when people hide their true selves from the ones they love. Read more

Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle: [A] noisy, eccentric, bizarrely lovable film. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: I can think of far less pleasant ways to pass 100 minutes -- many of them playing now at a theater near you. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Writer-director Raymond De Felitta is essentially offering a kinky-comic New Yawk version of a Greek tragedy here, and even if the whole thing is pretty implausible, it's also fairly entertaining. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Andy Garcia reminds you of what a cunning, likable actor he can be. Read more

Jake Coyle, Associated Press: The outer-borough oddities of City Island are hard to resist. Read more

David Denby, New Yorker: [It] won't put [Garcia] back on the main road, but he tries some new things in it, and it's fun to watch him work. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: There are some capable actors here, working very hard with very little. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: The performances are absurdly broad, and each story line is more outlandish than the last. But De Felitta's approach is so easygoing, and the waterside setting so irresistibly charming, you're bound to walk out in a great mood. Read more

Lou Lumenick, New York Post: De Felitta, who directed the wonderful Two Family House (2000), has a great feel for New York City's further reaches and a very sure hand with actors. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: City Island runs through its stockpile of impossibly melodramatic scenarios and manages to make them, and the respective Rizzos in their throes, feel genuine. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: An indie of the sort that achieved popularity during the 1990s but which has since fallen out of favor, City Island offers jokes worth laughing at and characters who earn their good turns of fortune. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: Garcia and Margulies, who worked so well together in George Hickenlooper's Man from Elysian Fields, show a sure feel for comedy here... Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: City Island is a relief for filmgoers dulled by Hollywood formula. Despite lapses into overstatement, it's nothing but good, sweet, breezy times. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: All the family secrets must come crashing together, of course, in an implausible, if impeccably crafted, collision of botched confessions, mistaken identities, handcuffs and risque outfits. Read more

Amy Biancolli, San Francisco Chronicle: The cast proves game for anything, from Emily Mortimer as Vince's floridly English acting-class partner to a beleaguered, bewhiskered Strait, here displaying a comic prowess and fond knack for exasperation. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: The slice-of-life comedy City Island is a charming throwback filled with authentic characters. Read more

Stephen Cole, Globe and Mail: Writer-director Raymond de Felitta understands that a proper farce, like a good campfire, needs plenty of friction to get started. Read more

Kevin B. Lee, Time Out: Who would think that a sleepy seaside snippet of the Bronx could foster a Faulkner novel's worth of family skeletons? Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: All the performances are warmly engaging, even though the characters are broad and scenarios occasionally extreme. For those tired of clashing titans or weepy teen romances, City Island is a breath of fresh air. Read more

Ronnie Scheib, Variety: Another expertly written joyride through the confines of narrowminded provincialism to cleansing self-awareness from indie director de Felitta. Read more

Melissa Anderson, Village Voice: An affectionate portrait of a lower-middle-class, outer-borough clan, City Island works best as an actor's showcase, with Margulies's aggrieved, simmering wife the stand-out. Read more

John Anderson, Washington Post: A very funny film, and one that operates at the sea level of humanity. Quaint. Slightly peculiar. Read more