The Remake

MOVIE DETAILS

Rating: 6.3 out of 10
Director: Lynne Alana Delaney
Writer: Lynne Alana Delaney
Star: Sally Kellerman, June Lockhart, Timothy Carhart
Genres: Comedy/Drama/Family/Romance
Release Date: January 30, 2018 (United States)

The Remake

The Remake is an example of how do it yourself or shoestring filmmaking can go wrong sometimes. In this boomer-centric romantic comedy, for instance, the leading lady took several key behind the scenes roles including producing and directing, and based her screenplay on her own self-published novel. Lynne Alana Delaney should be commended for her creative spirit but this movie turned out so heavy-handed and unconvincing that it’s hard not to wish she’d had more people help her bring this vanity project to life.

Set in Los Angeles, the film centers on a pair of one time co-stars whose off-screen romance ended very badly. Sheridan O’Connor (Delaney) and Riccardo Rossi (Delaney’s real-life husband Ruben Roberto Gomez) were teenagers when they made Passport to Love their breakout hit which also marked them as standard-bearers for ’70s audiences coming into their own. Some 30-odd years later, Passport director Frank Zelski (Timothy Carhart), hoping to revive his career with a sequel, hasn’t seen our spunky leads since Riccardo stood up Sheridan at the altar.

Zelski invites them both to read for the feature but wraps it in secrecy; neither knows what the project is about or more significantly who their co-star will be. This isn’t much more ludicrous than the notion that an American studio would throw millions of dollars behind a movie starring two actors whose marquee value peaked during Nixon’s first term.

Once you get past that bit of L.A.-based absurdity The Remake traffics heavily in Hollywood-speak served with a side order of tin ear the supposed clash of these fading movie star titans registers barely as a whimpery whine instead of the grand life-changing rift it should be. Sheridan still smarts over “being left at the altar by the randy Roman,” as well she might. But Riccardo, who turns out to have had a good reason for blowing town, is only delighted to see her. They leave their shared history unresolved and get down to business on the “major studio production” that looks no less chintzy than the movie we’re watching. The Remake deserves at least this much credit: It manages to join the bad-film-within-a-bad-film micro-subgenre.

There’s not one realistic or involving moment in any of the glimpses of moviemaking or in any part of the Sheridan-Riccardo melodrama, with its clumsily telegraphed twist and readily accessible cache of decades-old letters. Sheridan’s daughter (Tessa Munro) figures in as a pot-stirrer who gets to know her widowed mother’s long-ago lover; Patrika Darbo provides sitcom-y commentary and advice as Sheridan’s sister; Sally Kellerman does likewise as their aunt, lending her distinctively smoky voice to observations about aging in Hollywood a subject this story about second chances could have addressed more meaningfully if it had been so inclined.

The film is mainly faulty due to the performances of Delaney and Gomez. The former is especially guilty of excessive use of the eyes and both started acting in films and TV during their midlife crisis which only involved being extras. It is a good thing that they are following their passion but unfortunately they lack experience to anchor a full length feature.

Robert Romanus’ Riccardo’s agent gives the only performance that feels like a human being; Stanley B. Herman as Sheridan’s agent adds some needed grime to his smaller role. Poor June Lockhart, in her 90s, does her best with what amounts to the story’s villain a one-dimensional meanie who spews anti-Italian ethnic slurs in service of old-school WASP xenophobia.

Flatly lighted by DP Timothy Delaney to match the clunky dialogue, these visuals feature such repeated missteps as unhelpful framing or just plain inexplicable camera angles (no ugly ceiling goes unobserved). Private homes dressed up as restaurants are among the easily spotted locations that lend an air of awkwardness to the proceedings; Delaney took it upon herself to serve as production designer in her jack of all trades capacity, showing resourcefulness if not always persuasive sets. But Larry King isn’t even convincing as himself here, so sets are clearly low on this movie’s list.

For more movies like The Remake Visit Gomovies.