Word: chekhovian
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...grainy dysfunctional-family drama that seems to be aiming for a Chekhovian blend of humor and pathos, but falls far short of the mark. Its saving grace is solid ensemble acting, with Julianne Moore and "ER" darling Noah Wyle holding their own as the two central characters who make Thanksgiving a squirm with their barely-concealed resentment toward their taciturn and enigmatic father (Roy Scheider). Unfortunately, none of the characters here are given enough depth or dimension to earn any true empathy. --Lynn...
...grainy dysfunctional-family drama that seems to be aiming for a Chekhovian blend of humor and pathos, but falls far short of the mark. Its saving grace is solid ensemble acting, and Julianne Moore and "ER" darling Noah Wyle hold their own as the two central characters who make Thanksgiving squirmily uncomfortable with their barely-concealed resentment toward their tacitum and enigmatic father (Roy Scheider of "Jaws" fame). Unfortunately, none of the characters here are given enough depth or dimension to earn any true empathy...
Freundlich invokes the Chekhovian in both his unsentimental depiction of each family member's half-comic, half-pathetic weaknesses and his deliberate avoidance of a cinematically neat closure. Unfortunately, his script falls short of making the characters sufficiently three-dimensional to earn our empathy. We really learn only one or two things about each of them: that Warren's never gotten over his breakup with Daphne; that Jake's still struggling to say "I love you" to Margaret; and that Leigh hasn't outgrown being the baby of the family, though she's found time for an unaccountable but placid...
...surprising variety of roles over the decades: as the soft-spoken labor leader in The Organizer (1963), the homosexual fighting Fascism in A Special Day (1977), the Chekhovian philanderer in Dark Eyes (1987), the gentle padrone besotted by a dwarf in the Argentine I Don't Want to Talk About It (1993), his finest late role. He worked with ambitious auteurs from Altman to Zurlini; he lent his bankability to obscure projects. In his last year he starred with Chiara in Three Lives and Only One Death, an elaborate jape by the Paris-based Chilean Raul Ruiz, and appeared with...
...three, gender conflict is the dominant theme. Mysogyny in particular erupts from the mouths of men frustrated over petty disputes which their female interlocutors won't let them win. It's brilliant Chekhovian parody of how men clash with stubborn women and the antagonism that gets coaxed to the fore in the process...