Peter Marx

One of the best movies I have seen in a long time. I had almost given up on Hollywood being able to make both a substantial and and entertaining movie without pandering to all the special interest groups currently in vogue. I grew up in New York, in the sixties, in an extended Italian-American family. The movie brought back many memories without cartoonishly caricaturizing either Italian-Americans or Black-Americans. This movie is very well-balanced in regards to its portrayal of various socio-economic relationships, blue-collar family bonding, and male friendship. The script is excellent, believable, and realistic, doing full justice to the plot and characterization by filling in why this classical pianist and this chauffeur came to be the people they are. The movie could have had a lot of gratuitous violence, sex, and gender pandering, but, thankfully, it does not. This is an adult movie dealing with adult problems, for people who lived through the sixties, or for people who understand that discrimination, hatred, and inequality are not just black and white, male and female, straight and gay, or rich and poor-based problems. These defects start the human heart and may be conquered through courage, compassion, understanding, and from suffering together the torments of life.