{"id":14285,"date":"2014-05-06T11:31:43","date_gmt":"2014-05-06T18:31:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qgp.ykq.mybluehost.me\/cinephiled\/?p=14285"},"modified":"2014-05-06T16:08:11","modified_gmt":"2014-05-06T23:08:11","slug":"review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Chemistry Fuels the Uneven &#8216;Fading Gigolo&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>What you need to know about <em>Fading Gigolo<\/em>: The romantic comedy stars John Turturro as a middle-aged male prostitute. And Woody Allen plays his best friend and \u201cpimp.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Either you find that idea funny or you don\u2019t. And if you do, you\u2019ll probably enjoy this most peculiar comedy more than most. The movie uses their easy working chemistry as one of its best assets, and it also use that risky premise as its comic, launching-pad point, as it also takes some strangely dark and poignantly dramatic turns at times.<\/p>\n<p>Given its uneven tone, the film is a little more challenging than it probably needs to be. And sure, the <em>Deuce Bigalow<\/em> movies did a few similar things, albeit in a much-sleazier, less-inspired fashion (especially the 2005 sequel, <em>European Gigolo<\/em>). But given that so few movies these days give any substantial screen time to talented, but supposedly \u201caging\u201d character actors like Turturro and Liev Schreiber, you can\u2019t help but appreciate it a little more.<\/p>\n<p>Plus, Allen gets a chance to act in someone else\u2019s movie for a change, and seems positively energized and enthusiastic about that prospect.<\/p>\n<p>His longtime friend Turturro (who starred in Allen\u2019s <em>Hannah and Her Sisters<\/em>) wrote, directed and stars in this movie as its title character, Fioravonte, who makes a comfortable-enough living working part-time as a New York City florist.<\/p>\n<p>His cash-strapped, book store owner friend, Murray (Allen), has a business proposition for him, though. Noting how the, ahem, unconventionally handsome Fioravonte can talk to\/relate to the floral shop\u2019s middle-aged female clientele, Murray suggests that he become a specialized \u201cgigolo,\u201d one who caters to that same group. And, of course, Murray would be his \u201cmanager,\u201d ones who takes a cut for finding the lonely women who require Fioravonte\u2019s \u201cservices.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And not too surprisingly, his first few \u201ccustomers\u201d are satisfied, especially with the way he makes them feel at ease and feel appreciated. In fact, a couple of them seem a little too eager to have him return (Sharon Stone and <em>Modern Family\u2019s<\/em> Sofia Vergara are pitching him the idea of a menage). However, Fioravonte has made the mistake of falling for Avigal (former Johnny Depp \u201clife partner\u201d Vanessa Paradis), a shy, inexperienced Rabbi\u2019s widow.<\/p>\n<p>Avigal, though, is being pursued by a jealous admirer, Dovi (Schreiber), who isn\u2019t thrilled to see her keeping such \u201cbad company.\u201d And Murray has his own troubles, namely keeping the African-American family he supports well-fed and housed.<\/p>\n<p>Moreso than any of his earlier films (this is Turturro\u2019s fifth as a filmmaker), <em>Fading Gigolo<\/em> mimics the wry, often understated tone of several Allen films, as well as the long, dialogue-and-character-driven scene takes. And the film definitely has its share of laugh-out-loud moments, among them Murray adopting the pimp alter ego as \u201cDanny Bongo.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Where Turturro runs into trouble are the sometimes jarring tonal shifts. When the film finally turns serious, it\u2019s almost deadly serious, and then it has a hard time changing back to the lighter comedy. There are also so many characters that not all of them get as fleshed-out as they should\/need to be. (The ones played by Stone and Vergara are shallow but still somewhat amusing caricatures.)<\/p>\n<p>The somewhat nebulous ending may bother some viewers as well, and so will the luxurious pacing (90 minutes turns out to be more than enough time for the movie). Luckily, there\u2019s real chemistry between these actors. The cast-against-type Paradis (1999\u2019s <em>Girl on the Bridge<\/em>) works well with both Turturro and Schreiber (Showtime\u2019s <em>Ray Donovan<\/em>). And the hilarious, line-swapping scenes involving Turturro and Allen\u2019s characters are more than enough to make this film worthwhile, particularly for fans of the two actor\/directors.<\/p>\n<p><em>Jeff Michael Vice can also be read reviewing comics and television for Big Shiny Robot! (<\/em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bigshinyrobot.com\">www.bigshinyrobot.com<\/a><em>), be heard reviewing films, television programs, comics, books, music and other things as part of The Geek Show Podcast (<\/em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thegeekshowpodcast.com\">www.thegeekshowpodcast.com<\/a><em>), and be seen reviewing films as part of Xfinity\u2019s Big Movie Mouth-Off (<\/em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BigMovieMouthOff\"><em>www.facebook.com\/BigMovieMouthOff<\/em><\/a><em>).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What you need to know about Fading Gigolo: The romantic comedy stars John Turturro as a middle-aged male prostitute. And Woody Allen plays his best friend and \u201cpimp.\u201d Either you find that idea funny or you don\u2019t. And if you do, you\u2019ll probably enjoy this most peculiar comedy more than most. The movie uses their [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":14289,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13,16,99],"tags":[2,4,536,1751,1825,1283,981,270,1753,1752,1754,1123],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Review: Chemistry Fuels the Uneven &#039;Fading Gigolo&#039;  - Cinephiled<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Review: Chemistry Fuels the Uneven &#039;Fading Gigolo&#039;  - Cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What you need to know about Fading Gigolo: The romantic comedy stars John Turturro as a middle-aged male prostitute. And Woody Allen plays his best friend and \u201cpimp.\u201d Either you find that idea funny or you don\u2019t. And if you do, you\u2019ll probably enjoy this most peculiar comedy more than most. The movie uses their [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BigMovieMouthOff\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-05-06T18:31:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-05-06T23:08:11+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/fadinggigolo_01.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"695\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"350\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeff Michael Vice\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@JeffMichaelVice\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Cinephiled\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jeff Michael Vice\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/\",\"name\":\"Review: Chemistry Fuels the Uneven 'Fading Gigolo' - Cinephiled\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/fadinggigolo_01.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-05-06T18:31:43+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-05-06T23:08:11+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#\/schema\/person\/4a40f2c344ca429bd78eb836b98847bf\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/fadinggigolo_01.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/fadinggigolo_01.jpg\",\"width\":695,\"height\":350},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/review-chemistry-fuels-uneven-fading-gigolo\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Review: Chemistry Fuels the Uneven &#8216;Fading Gigolo&#8217;\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/\",\"name\":\"Cinephiled\",\"description\":\"Movie Reviews, Interviews and Analysis for Film Lovers\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#\/schema\/person\/4a40f2c344ca429bd78eb836b98847bf\",\"name\":\"Jeff Michael Vice\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.cinephiled.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/df298a98bd693bea56d0730dd55517bc?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/df298a98bd693bea56d0730dd55517bc?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"caption\":\"Jeff Michael Vice\"},\"description\":\"Utah-based movie writer and all-around smart aleck Jeff Michael Vice can be read reviewing films, television programs, comics, books, music and other things for the Big Shiny Robot! 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