Product: Moonstruck (1987)
Rating: 5.0
Bella! Bella!
Moostruck is one of those rare films in which everything--ensemble cast, music, script, cinematography--comes together in a perfect mesh.The movie is nothing more than it pretends to be: a sweet little comedy. But it combines such a wealth of talent on so many levels that it ends up being a truly special experienceCher is perfection in this movie. She is a fine actress, and carries off a blend of comedy and pathos in a way that makes the viewer want to shake her and hug her by turns. Cher plays a young widow who lives with her extended Italian-American family in New York. Her day job is not too exciting: she works in a funeral parlor. And by night, she works equally hard to get her middle-aged beau, Johnnie, to marry her. Not for love, mind you--she believes that love died with her deceased husband--but for security.Of course the plot thickens, to include Johnnie's extremely eclectic but surprisingly sexy younger brother, played to the hilt by Nicolas Cage. The brother, a baker, has lost a hand in a work-related accident, and nurses a longtime grudge against Johnnie, whom he blames for causing the mishap. Cher gets herself involved in the feud--and finds herself swept away in a mad love affair.The supporting cast is superb. Olivia Dukakis is Cher's acerbic and still-attractive mother, the doyenne of the traditional Italian home. The late Vincent Guardino, a plumber with grandiose delusions about his sexual attractiveness, gives a bravura performance as the father with a wandering eye.At the end of this unpretentious movie, which makes no claim to philosophical depth, the viewer is left with a big smile and a feeling of warm pleasure. I have viewed this movie countless times, and it never fails to delight me.