[yasr_overall_rating]
Dr. Abe Mandelbaum has just moved into a new manor with his ailing wife. After forming an unlikely friendship with a womanizing gambler, their relationship is tested when they each try to convince a mysterious nurse that they are her long-lost father.
There’s no denying the legendary status of Martin Landau and Paul Sorvino, the leads of Howard Weiner’s dramedy “Abe & Phil’s Last Poker Game.” The former – who passed away earlier this year – has graced the silver screens since the late 1950s, with such unforgettable performances as the Academy Award-nominated turn as Judah in Woody Allen’s “Crimes and Misdemeanors” and the role that finally brought him the long-deserved Oscar, his heartbreaking Bela Lugosi in Tim Burton’s black-and-white masterpiece, “Ed Wood.” The latter has appeared in over 100 film and video titles since the early 1970s, in such roles as Henry Kissinger in Oliver Stone’s “Nixon.” Fulgencio Capulet in Baz Luhrmann’s “Romeo + Juliet” and, of course, Paul Cicero in Martin Scorsese’s “Goodfellas.”
Among the two of them, they’ve covered everything from Dostoevsky to Shakespeare (with, admittedly, some less, ahem, literary choices in-between). Now the stalwarts come head to head in what I assume is Landau’s last screen performance. This Meeting of the Greats is orchestrated by none other than… Howard Weiner, who wrote and directed this feature, and whose only other credit is a low-budget religious documentary titled “What Is Life? The Movie.” My expectations skyrocketed upon stumbling upon this little factoid.
After a languid, flatly-shot opening, the “made-for-TV” vibe continues throughout the film, with boring framing devices and a maudlin soundtrack. After a minor stroke, Abe (Landau), a doctor who snaps anytime anyone refers to him as “mister,” moves to Cliffside Manor, a home for the elderly, ruled by the “old-man-hating” Grollman (Alexander Cook). Abe brings his wife Molly (Ann Marie Shea) along, but soon forms a friendship with the disease-ridden Phil (Sorvino), and the two get into shenanigans, most of them involving getting laid. “The things that gave me pleasure in my life,” Phil says, “were baseball, poker, and fucking, but not in that order.” While Phil is humorously/tragically dying, Abe is pursuing the hot 50-something intern who gets him “harder than I’ve ever been!”
In a house full of clichéd inhabitants – the womanizer, the seductive volunteer with painful “pits” in her face (don’t ask) – the chain-smoking Angela (Maria Dizza) is just another stereotype: a lost 30-something, looking for her father. Upon meeting Abe for the second time, Angela bears her soul to him, involving adoption and nightmares and existential angst. Both old men are potential – though unlikely – fathers. Abe, Phil, and Angela do converge at a poker table (albeit very briefly, rendering the title misleading), truths surface, words are spewed, folks die, blah blah blah.
It would be a pleasure to watch the two actors emote – except that they are emoting in a sap-infested melodrama. Landau looks into a mirror, all nostalgic, decades of life passing through his eyes, and one can’t help but imagine the actor going out on a less sour note. Similarly, Sorvino is underserved here – he tries his best, his dying character never losing the spark in his eye, yet he’s put through the motions. Their old people back-and-forth rapport is somewhat charming, but also eye-rolling and sometimes gag-inducing. Speaking of, there are not one or two but THREE lovemaking scenes that are lunkheaded and uncomfortable and misguided.
And the music swells and swells. Filled with stilted dialogue, such as “How am I supposed to know who I am if I don’t know where I came from?” and “Follow your heart,” Howard Weiner’s film fails on most accounts. As a rumination on death and cosmic questions, it’s lackluster. As a sobering, wistful comedy, it’s next-to-worthless: it’s blatant, borderline-vulgar in its lack of subtlety. As a treatise on dying, it says nothing new. I’ve mentioned Michael Haneke’s “Amour” in my reviews before, a devastating masterpiece about Love and Dying. Forget “Abe and Phil…” – which ticks off so many clichés, the book’s not thick enough – and watch “Amour” instead. If you would like to see the two stalwarts, Landau and Sorvino, at their peak, be sure to add “Ed Wood” and “Goodfellas” to that eclectic cinematic trifecta.
In theaters and on VOD January 12th
There really isn\’t an age where one\’s level of horniness is of interest to the outside world. The topic is certainly cringe-inducing as we listen in on two old men bemoaning their current state of dysfunction, while simultaneously recalling their glorious past conquests. Were these two gents played by lesser actors than screen legends Martin Landau and Paul Sorvino, there would be no need to tune in.