Product: Moonstruck (1987)
Rating: 5.0
A Great Romantic-Comedy
When Moonstruck was released, it caused a sensation. It won Academy Awards for Best Actress (Cher), Best Supporting Actress (Olympia Dukakis), and Best Screenplay (John Patrick Shanley). To this day, it still ranks on critic's lists as one of the best romantic comedies. Maybe that's because it uses a different formula and, with that, is a different kind of romantic comedy. Cher plays Loretta, a Brooklyn woman who has just got engaged to Johnny (Danny Aiello), the day he's leaving for Sicily to visit his dying mother. He asks her, before he leaves, to go see his brother Ronny and invite him to the wedding. Ronny and Johnny haven't spoken in a while, there's been some "bad blood" but Johnny wants to make it right. When Loretta goes to meet Ronny (Nicolas Cage), she falls for him. It's not an immediate, movie-like falling in love. It just happens and when she wakes up the next morning, she knows that they can't see each other again. He makes her a deal; Go to the opera with him and she won't have to see him again. From the time when they have sex up to the end of the movie, it's almost amazing how quickly it flies by. Anyway, there's also the story about Loretta's mother Rose (Dukakis), who knows that her husband Cosmo is cheating on her and has asked various men...Why do men cheat? Dukakis' performance, for an Oscar winning performance, isn't your typical extravagant performance. It's kinda low-key. Cher's performance isn't the typical Oscar winning performance either, but I guess it was the accent. All the actors deliver Oscar worthy performances; Nicolas Cage has played a lot of characters similar to Ronny, which makes his performance all the more effective. A lot of the things he says would sound too goofy coming from another actor, but coming from Cage...It sounds fine. Overall, the movie's funny and charming...There's no real flaws I noticed while watching it and, with that, I highly recommend it.GRADE: A-