Two Lovers

James Gray's Two Lovers is a portrait in miniature of
middle-class Jewish angst in Brooklyn's Brighton Beach, centered on Joaquin Phoenix's wounded, bipolar Leonard Kraditor. Phoenix's damaged vulnerability, constantly perceptible below his manic effusiveness and depressive shyness, recalls Marlon Brando's performance in On the Waterfront. Now, as much as any comparison to Brando invites charges of hyperbole, I challenge you to watch Phoenix's hunched walk through Brighton Beach and not once think of Hoboken's own Terry Malloy ­ and Gray reveals his complicity in this comparison by making overt use of a particular clothing item that also has strong symbolic value in Waterfront. Phoenix's performance is a new pinnacle for the acclaimed actor and, one must hope, not his last.

While Phoenix's Leonard is the beating heart of the film, Gray surrounds him with an exceptional cast of actors who create the most realistic Jewish characters to appear onscreen in this millennium. First among them is Vinessa Shaw as Sandra, the daughter of the family's business partner, who courts Leonard with the full approval of his parents. Shaw is just as subtle as Phoenix and imbues Sandra with warmth, earthy charm, and more sex appeal than young Jewish women are usually allowed to have onscreen. Leonard sees Sandra as a safe choice, but there is nothing safe about Shaw's performance, which could be the definitive "nice Jewish girl-next-door." Israeli-born Moni Moshonov is excellent as Leonard's father, Reuben, but Isabella Rossellini does not strip away enough of her old-country refinement to convincingly play an immigrant Jewish mother. Nevertheless, she has a breathtaking scene with Phoenix near the film's climax. Bob Ari and Julie Budd give fine, understated performances as Sandra's parents.

Of course, Leonard cannot fully accept marrying into his father and father-in-law's shared dry-cleaning business and falls in love with Michelle (Gwyneth Paltrow), the beautiful and quasi-mysterious shiksa-next-door. Paltrow gives it her all, but because her character possesses so many off-putting neuroses, it is difficult to imagine what Leonard sees in her beyond her obvious beauty and the fact that she is nothing like his parents' choice for him. Michelle is also introduced as a neighborhood girl -- a distractingly unbelievable choice that Gray reconciles, without suspense, much too late in the film. Although Gray approaches Leonard's infatuation with total sincerity, I never wanted Leonard and Michelle's relationship to take flight ­ Shaw's Sandra really is that appealing ­ and therefore, I watched their scenes unfold with a mounting frustration that did not dissipate until after the film's conclusion. James Gray's precise direction hits a few false notes -- especially the suicide attempt and flashback that open the film, which have little emotional resonance because they occur out of context -- but they are somewhat smoothed-over by the stellar performances and Gray's strong use of Brighton Beach locations.

In fact, I enjoyed Two Lovers more in retrospect than I did
watching it. As the film unspools, the distance between the depth of the characters and the simplicity of their story grows increasingly wide, but this is easily forgotten after it ends. Conversely, the film's warmth and emotional generosity linger for days. Two Lovers is moving, beguiling, sometimes frustrating, and beautifully evocative of a bygone era of American filmmaking, when the loves and miseries of "ordinary" middle-class characters could be treated without a hint of snarky detachment and pack an emotional wallop.

                                                      Stuart Weinstock