Andy Garcia is Byron, a novelist with one successful book, now remaindered. His publisher rejects his new manuscript because maybe it seems too demanding and not interesting enough -- it's about migrant workers as America in microcosm. Garcia is rather stuck. He's out of money and has a wife and child to support.
He accidentally falls in with an unrecognizable Mick Jagger, who runs a male escort service for rich, lonely women. I said Jagger was unrecognizable, not because he has aged so terribly but because his lower lip appears to be missing.
Rather ashamed of himself, Garcia accepts Jagger's offer of a job and keeps it a secret from his loving wife. In his store-fresh evening clothes, Garcia meets his steady date, Olivia Williams, who should definitely not have to pay for an escort. But the money doesn't matter to her. She's married to the moribund Pulitzer-Prize-winning novelist James Coburn. Coburn is the open-minded sort who allows Garcia to sleep openly with his wife.
When Coburn discovers that Garcia too is a writer, he asks him to look over his last manuscript, over which he has slaved for twelve years. It's to be his legacy, he announces. Unfortunately, it stinks. Accepting this judgment with considerable grace -- after punching Garcia in the nose for telling him -- Coburn enlists Garcia's aid in rewriting it, in return for co-authorship and 30% of the royalties. It's Garcia's big break. He recognizes it and jumps for it. Basically, he turns Coburn's novel into his own story of migrant workers as microcosm.
I don't think I want to get into this any further except to say that Garcia's wife finds out about the deal -- he's been lying to her about it -- and she leaves him, taking their child.
Garcia usually plays his roles as subdued and a little passive, and that's what he does here. It suits the character though. The problem is that nothing much ever really happens. Mick Jagger is the paid escort of Angelica Huston and he falls in love with her, and she laughs it off. (What's that got to do with the plot?) There are a couple of witty conversational exchanges and a few apothegms but no fireworks are to be seen. Not even the intimation of a cherry bomb about to pop. No sputtering sparklers. Nothing. The actors hit their marks, say their lines, go through the paces.
I found it a little disappointing, although it's an adult movie without any clear-cut heroes and villains. Every character is appropriately ambiguous. Every move is a little tentative when it should be. Except for Garcia's wife finding out about his work and storming out, evidently for good, after giving him a dressing down. She seems to toggle from adoration to hatred.
If you don't mind slow-moving films with adult themes, you might find it more enjoyable than I did. It's not insulting. It doesn't pander. It just seems to trudge along without much life.
He accidentally falls in with an unrecognizable Mick Jagger, who runs a male escort service for rich, lonely women. I said Jagger was unrecognizable, not because he has aged so terribly but because his lower lip appears to be missing.
Rather ashamed of himself, Garcia accepts Jagger's offer of a job and keeps it a secret from his loving wife. In his store-fresh evening clothes, Garcia meets his steady date, Olivia Williams, who should definitely not have to pay for an escort. But the money doesn't matter to her. She's married to the moribund Pulitzer-Prize-winning novelist James Coburn. Coburn is the open-minded sort who allows Garcia to sleep openly with his wife.
When Coburn discovers that Garcia too is a writer, he asks him to look over his last manuscript, over which he has slaved for twelve years. It's to be his legacy, he announces. Unfortunately, it stinks. Accepting this judgment with considerable grace -- after punching Garcia in the nose for telling him -- Coburn enlists Garcia's aid in rewriting it, in return for co-authorship and 30% of the royalties. It's Garcia's big break. He recognizes it and jumps for it. Basically, he turns Coburn's novel into his own story of migrant workers as microcosm.
I don't think I want to get into this any further except to say that Garcia's wife finds out about the deal -- he's been lying to her about it -- and she leaves him, taking their child.
Garcia usually plays his roles as subdued and a little passive, and that's what he does here. It suits the character though. The problem is that nothing much ever really happens. Mick Jagger is the paid escort of Angelica Huston and he falls in love with her, and she laughs it off. (What's that got to do with the plot?) There are a couple of witty conversational exchanges and a few apothegms but no fireworks are to be seen. Not even the intimation of a cherry bomb about to pop. No sputtering sparklers. Nothing. The actors hit their marks, say their lines, go through the paces.
I found it a little disappointing, although it's an adult movie without any clear-cut heroes and villains. Every character is appropriately ambiguous. Every move is a little tentative when it should be. Except for Garcia's wife finding out about his work and storming out, evidently for good, after giving him a dressing down. She seems to toggle from adoration to hatred.
If you don't mind slow-moving films with adult themes, you might find it more enjoyable than I did. It's not insulting. It doesn't pander. It just seems to trudge along without much life.