King of the Corner (2004)

and the weakest link was the up and coming business hot shot played by Jake Hoffman (Dustin Hoffman's son.) He was too young and goofy to play a ruthless guy moving up in the business world.id have to say, i disagree with you. he was not supposed to play a ruthless guy moving up in the business world. I believe his role was that of an young and goofy guy who is accidentally moving up and moving into Leos spot. what i got from the film was that everything that was happening to Leo's job in regards to the young guy was all accidental or unintentional. he seemed to never want to take Leo's spot and he thought he was doing good at what he was hired to do. maybe thats just my take on it

Ell Wallach's performance as the lively, irascible and crotchety "King of the Corner" is the best I have seen this year. It is a shame this movie has not received distribution as it will probably doom his chances during award season. This work is a crown on his golden career that entitles him to be there.I presume the distribution was not achieved because it was perceived to be "too Jewish." As a WV hillbilly and Friend (Quaker) this is a human movie about the human condition not just the Jewish condition.I do not need car crashes, aliens, or super heroes. If Hollywood is wondering why people are staying home, it is because movies like this one can not find a distributor.Many thanks to Peter Riegert (writer, director and actor) for supporting his jewel of a film. Maybe someone will allow him to make a whole movie about Sol Spivak. THAT IS A MOVIE I REALLY WANT TO SEE!

I saw King of the Corner this evening and was very impressed by the story and the acting. I'm in my mid 50"s and have been through much of the same mid life upheavals that Leo has to navigate through. I could relate to the relationship with his father, where you try to downplay what an ailing parent says because you are really helpless to change the course of things to come. In as fine a piece of acting as I have seen in along time, Peter Riegert displays the helplessness and denial that comes when you find out you have lost a loved one. I thought all the characters came across as people I'm familiar with, even the goofy Rabbi. What parent of a teen hasn't wanted to call the police when their kid is late coming home. It all rang true and if you've been through it watching these scenes are bittersweet. I didn't see Leo as a bad Jew or person, just someone with a heart trying to protect his little kingdom on this planet and meeting some frustration. I have always been a fan of Mr. Riegert and with this performance he once more showed me a character who quietly and with a dose of subtle humor defines the human condition.

It is hard to tell just what the point of this film is. It seems it is about an advertising agency and the people working in the agency. It is also about the relationship of the star (Peter Reigert) with his father (Eli Wallach) who is in a nursing home in Arizona. It also has bits and pieces of other stories, the relationship of Reigert's daughter with her boyfriend and other trivia.My impression is that the writer wanted to make a movie, but did not have a story to keep the audience interested for an hour and a half so he seemed to try other ways to draw an audience by including such big names as Rita Moreno, Isabella Rosselini, Eli Wallach. He also made most of the principal characters Jewish, perhaps in hopes of drawing a bigger audience to a trivial film.I saw this picture in San Francisco, a city with a large movie going audience and the theater was almost empty. Although I did hear one woman laugh, most of the sparse audience appeared to be bored with the film.