Frankie and Johnny (1991)

This is one of the lesser known and appreciated screen gems of the 90's. It's a superior romantic-comedy-drama which stars screen legend Al Pacino and screen goddess Michelle Pfeiffer. The movie is so much more about the love story. It is a very perceptive movie about people who are lonely and people who are trapped into their own lives. The movie has an achingly melancholic mood. Pfeiffer was phenomenal and proved that she deserved the part. Her beauty was toned down to make her look as ordinary as possible. The character she played has so much depth and layer that is pretty uncommon for films generally regarded as romance films. Pacino of course was good, this is his and Pfeiffer's second team up after "Scarface" of course I love the fact that he played the role with such ease and charm which is a lot different from his more serious roles before. The supporting actors Nathan Lane and Kate Nelligan stole some scenes.There are some lovely moments,. I liked the scene in the flower market, where the two are standing together and the metal door slides up to display a dazzling backdrop of red and orange flowers. Also, the final scene with the toothbrushes and Claire de Lune is nicely done. Pfeiffer is particularly good here and Pacino backs her up all the way. Still there are so many hackneyed clichés. Perhaps its just that we have seen so many films, good ones in which people are more realistically portrayed that it's annoying to see so many old-timey stock types: the good hearted gay buddy, the good hearted but slutty waitress buddy, the good hearted Greek restaurant owner, the good hearted homely waitress buddy, the good-hearted Puerto-Rican busboy and the good-hearted black busboy. Then there are the good hearted clients. If they had gone for realistic characterizations of some of these people rather than going for heart-warming "types" this could have been a much better film. I blame Garry Marshall for this. Pacino and Pfeiffer did their best to bring some class to this film.Overall rating: 8 out of 10.

You have to admit when watching this film , Johnny steals everyone's heart's. Who wouldn't like someone like Johnny in their lives? I mean the guy is just really the one to be with. Boy I'm so mind blown of Al Pacino's character, he is just literally romantic. As Bruno Mars has said in his song "Uptown Funk", Michele Pfeiffer definitely is pure gold and with this role, she killed it. She really knows how to act as a emotionally disturbed woman who has been through a lot. I mean, I honestly thought that she was a wimp for keep on saying no to him but, as the story goes, you really go deep on the reasons why she is finding life hard. That's what I like about this movie, it opens up reality such as domestic abuse. It really stands out on the issues we are facing in real life unfortunately. Thankfully Frankie met the wonderful Johnny and her next door neighbour left her abusive partner for his misery. I love this movie, it's so powerful and emotional that I think it should've been deserved an Oscar, not a nominated Golden Globe...

Twenty years on – and "Frankie and Johnny" has arguably improved with age. This is because it deals with the rawest human emotions and vulnerabilities and shows that when life is tough the need for community is greatest. Even if, maybe especially if, the members of that community are as dysfunctional and scarred as we are. For many of the characters in this movie life has been very tough indeed. The restaurant where Johnny gets a job, and where Frankie works, is at the centre of the lives of many of its regulars. It does not have "Community Centre" on a sign above the door – but this is, in effect, what it is. The tolerant proprietor, Nick, sympathetically portrayed by Hector Elizondo, has built that community and he is as protective of his customers as he is of his staff. Nick is a Greek-American and it is subtly suggested that the customers and employees at his little restaurant are a sort of extended Greek family - although in fact they are as ethnically diverse as New York can be."Frankie and Johnny" is above all about loneliness. Frankie has a real family – we see them at the beginning at a christening – but it is clear that they have their own lives and that Frankie, partly out of choice, is not really part of that world. As the film develops we start to realise that Frankie's introspection and the barriers she erects around herself are attributable to a couple of failed relationships in the past. In one her partner left her for her best friend and in the other she was physically abused to the extent that she cannot have children. Johnny is equally damaged. We see him released from prison but it is not until quite late in the film that it is revealed that his crime, whilst serious, was a one-off fraud and that he is no serial offender. In prison he learnt to cook and that is now more than just a job to him – it has become a passion. Johnny was married but his wife left him and took their two children into a new relationship. There is a brief poignant vignette when Johnny watches his children with their mother and new "father" in an American dream suburban family scene – complete with white picket fence. He leaves without revealing his presence.From early in the movie it is clear that Frankie and Johnny are made for each other. Despite the wounds they carry (actual physical wounds to her head in Frankie's case) they are good caring people – albeit that like Nick they do this without wearing a "Social Worker" badge. Frankie has a moving relationship with a Gay neighbour, Tim (Nathan Lane) that manages to avoid being patronising or clichéd. Similarly her bonding with her fellow workers is natural and important to them all – not least Cora the archetypal strong, no-nonsense New York woman who, deep down, is as lonely as she is. Like all the characters Cora is deeper than, and different to, her veneer. When a woman heavily pregnant with twins comes to the restaurant she touches her belly and says "People think I'm a tough b*tch, but it ain't true. Sh*t like this chokes me up." That Frankie and Johnny will eventually end up happily together seems obvious form the start, but that doesn't always happen in the movies does it? Along the way they battle, largely out of fear on Frankie's side. Johnny ardour is declared early on and we don't doubt that it is genuine. Frankie is more circumspect – unsurprisingly given the extent that she has been damaged by her last relationships. So whilst the romance is strong a happy ending is not certain and when it happens we are grateful because it is uplifting to think that even if the barriers are high they can sometimes be removed in the interests of true love.The casting of Frankie and Johnny is very good and all the minor characters, however crazy they may be are utterly credible because they are so well played. As for the leads both Pacino and Pfeiffer give sensitive and credible performances although both of them are so devastatingly good looking that they do seem a bit out of place amongst the ordinary New Yorkers who are very "West Side" in appearance rather than Upper East. Not many of them shop on Fifth Avenue whereas Frankie and Johnny do look a bit like people who habitually do this, except on dress-down day. Nevertheless although they are younger and lovelier than the characters in the original stage play ("Frankie and Johnny in the Clair De Lune") this works fine and doesn't detract from the heart and the humanity of the story.A year or so after Frankie and Johnny was released the long running TV series Friends premiered. One of the central characters in Friends was, of course, Rachel Green (Jennifer Aniston) who was initially a waitress in a Coffee House with a history of complex and damaging relationships behind her. Rachel Green is not Frankie – but there is a strong parallel not least because it is "friends" in both cases who provide the support when it's needed. Frankie says at one point "I'm afraid. I'm afraid to be alone, I'm afraid not to be alone. I'm afraid of what I am, what I'm not, what I might become, what I might never become. I don't want to stay at my job for the rest of my life but I'm afraid to leave. And I'm just tired, you know, I'm just so tired of being afraid". The message of Frankie and Johnny is that friends can reduce that fear. Love can take it away.

I just caught up with this via a national newspaper freebie and I didn't find it a chore to watch in spite of the fact I could have written it myself after the first reel. Thing is I actually like these Broadway rom-coms interchangeable though they may be - here, for example, we were watching a variation on The Owl And The Pussycat, the twist - if you can call it that - being that the guy is in love with the gal from the get-go instead of being beaten into submission by her kookiness. Frankie isn't exactly an almost-hooker but she is a waitress and Johnny isn't exactly a wannabee writer but he does have the better education albeit self-taught. Add strong support in the shape of Kate Nelligan and Nathan Lane and what's not to like.