heart's in the right place

Rating: 7/10 (22 February 2019)

It's 1962 New York City. "Tony Lip" Vallelonga (Viggo Mortensen) is a nightclub bouncer and a tough guy ingratiating himself with gangsters. When his workplace gets shut down for a two month renovation, he gets a job driving peculiar classical pianist Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali) to his concerts in the deep south.
There are issues but the movie has its heart in the right place. I don't mind the racist Tony Lip finding redemption and friendship in Shirley. Viggo is doing it pretty broadly but the main problem is Shirley. There are scenes where Farrelly is desperate for humor but it only heightens my disbelief. First is the cringeworthy KFC. It's crazy that a man has never had fried chicken despite coming from the south. The point should have been that he prefers not to eat fried chicken (and watermelon and collard greens and grits). It's not that he doesn't like it. He avoids it to avoid his roots. The same goes for the music. He's a musician for heaven's sake. Maybe he's not up to date but he had probably studied aspects of modern music and he's probably met a few of those artists. It's all wrong. His broadly played homosexuality is also a little awkward. I was really scared where Farrelly was taking that until it was saved by Tony who as a nightclub bouncer claims to have seen it all. It's a nice surprising twist to his character and in keeping with his transactional nature. Even the letter writing could be improved if some forethought had occurred. There is no reason why Dolores would go gaga over the letters when she suspects that it's Shirley's writing. She should hold back on the affection with the other girls going gaga. Only when she gets the house letter does she goes head over heels. It would show that she knows him best. These little nagging issues keep the movie from being great although I still enjoyed it.