Handsome Harry

Handsome Harry (2009)

The title is perfectly understated, and a bit misleading, whatever your first impressions. Harry is the main character, a man around 60 with memories of a brutal beating he and some fellow sailors gave a mate of theirs in the Viet Nam era. Long ago. The main thread of the movie follows him as he revisits each of the participants, including the man who was beaten.

With such a solid structure you are in some ways hooked. Each encounter has its own twists. And each time we see, through flashbacks, a sharpening picture of what really happened. It's a fascinating building of a story, even with some weakness here and there in the writing and acting.

And key to it all is a misguided homophobia, and what turns out to be a more complicated fear of being outed and a little self-loathing. Some of the characters Harry visits are finely tuned types, well acted. We see how everyone has changed, and how their sense of who they are, alone and to each other, has also changed.

Most of all we see Harry come to terms with his own demons on this. Jamey Sheridan plays him with studied restraint, and yet gives the man enough believable nuances to keep it honest. The biggest name in the cast is the first of Harry's encounters, Steve Buscemi, but if you are a fan of his (as you should be) be prepared that his role is really limited. And John Savage appears as one of the group, too. There are some strains in the other actors' parts either because of their ability to pull off a mostly talking movie or because the writing itself stumbles. In particular you'll see Harry barge into a classroom and interrupt the teacher and sort of take over the podium for a minute, and it's so out of character and unlikely it almost punctures the whole movie.

But hang in there. The final chapter or two is intense and written with poignancy. And it might surprise some viewers. A strong finish to a good, sometimes lugubrious, somewhat strained telling.

I watched this moving while knowing NOTHING about it - and I am VERY glad I did.

There are so many movies out there that I always spend lots of time looking through IMDb to decide whether a movie is worth my time or not. First I check the rating, and then if it is over 5.5 I read the summary and maybe some reviews and sometimes the Message board comments.

I'm SO GLAD I didn't know anything about this movie when I watched it. I won't spoil the movie for you by pointing out the main conflict the movie takes a long time to get around to telling us all about.

But that is what I liked about this movie. It tells the story about a crime that occurred long ago - and we just start to get hints about what really happened - slowly - as the story plays out - and it is rather fascinating to watch the truth come to dawn on the main character.

The story is fairly obviously about Harry who is asked by his friend Thomas to do a favour for him on his deathbed and apologize to their long ago friend for something Thomas did that he thought he was going to go to hell for.

Harry was drunk the night this fight happened, and he can't remember much of what happened - but what I think is really cool is that by the end of the movie I'm starting to wonder if his mind made him intentionally forget what happened. Sometimes what we've done is so traumatic we choose to forget what we did.

Very painful memories from a very long time ago come back to Harry - and parts of this movie really made me cry.

This movie deserves 8 or 9 stars - and it is SO, SO much better to see something like this than some shallow characters in a car chase and fights and shootouts, blah blah blah.

I loved this movie. It sneaks up on you. It's message is obviously to be honest with yourself and don't let your life pass you by without telling those you love how you feel.

Don't miss this movie - and trust me - and take my word for it - please watch this movie before you read any other reviews.

It's better to see this movie before you know what it is about.

I did - and I'm glad I did.

At the start of the movie, I don't recall anyone saying where it took place, but after some time has passed, we can conclude it is not close to Philadelphia, Chicago or Miami. One character makes a reference to Albany like it is nearby, and the closing credits say it was made in New York state.

Wherever this movie takes place, Harry is ready to retire and turn his electrical business over to his top employee Pauley. Harry was an electrician in the Navy and worked for a business when he got out, later taking it over, and then he went somewhere that would let him forget something terrible that happened in his life, taking over another electrical business. Muriel, a waitress who seems to be a potential romantic partner, warns him retirement could kill him. Harry doesn't seem to care about that.

Harry's son Bobby comes from Chicago to spend time with his dad on his birthday. That doesn't turn out to be a very satisfactory visit, as Harry's old Navy friend Kelley calls to ask Harry to visit him in a VA hospital in Philadelphia, where he is near death. And Bobby is having his own problems.

Kelley fears he will not be forgiven for what the group did to Kagan. It takes us a while to find out exactly what happened, but they must have done something really bad. Flashbacks show the events that led up to what the men did. Kelley's memory is not clear because the men had been drinking, and Harry isn't too sure either. Harry continues his travels by visiting some of the others who participated.

Flashbacks show the friendship between Harry and Kagan, including a visit to his parents. It's a nice scene.

Rheems is not a nice man, abusive to his wife, and rejecting his homosexual son. The wife is attracted to Harry and wants to leave.

When Harry interrupts his college class, Prof. Porter denies having even been in the Navy, but the professor admits to having been a part of the group. Harry still doesn't get a clear answer.

Harry also visits Peter, who has a strong Christian faith which was made stronger my his wife's terrible accident, which left her paralyzed and completely dependent on others..

Harry finally goes to Miami to met with Kagan. Eventually, he gets the answers he seeks, and we learn what really happened.

This is a pretty good movie, with a number of moral questions and no easy answers.

I think all the leading actors do a good job. Steve Buscemi is always good, of course. I'm not familiar with Jamey Sheridan but he carries the movie. Campbell Scott stands out near the end as Kagan, not necessarily doing the expected. Karen Young also stands out as Muriel.

The music in this movie is great. Much of it is real jazz. Kagan was a talented pianist, and in the flashbacks, the members of his group loved jazz. Harry also sings with a doo-wop group and they're very good. They perform after a Barbershop group.

I think it's worth seeing.

.....in a new subclass of male / female sexuality: "STI-FLEXUALS."

(( "STI-FLEXUALITY"......it's a whole new word....a whole new descriptive title for a subclass of human sexuality. Beginning today, there is not only Heterosexuality....Homosexuality....Bisexuality..., BUT also this new subcategory. And peculiar to this subclass of "Stifled Sexuality" comes a new label for the Killer Fear that suppressing such feelings and behavior generates in us: "CLOSETOPHOBIA"....fear of coming out of the you-know-what )).

(( And when, in your less than fully happy life, events arise which force you to realize that it is YOU who have Stifled...no, Crushed...the God-given purpose in life of another human being (in very fact, the Love of Your Life), you become nothing less than a Shattered human being. Your only...ONLY hope being the possibility of Forgiveness" )).

Given us by this film....this writer....this director and, ultimately, by Harry himself....are vividly disturbing scenes of the devastating emotional and physical damages that such "Stifling" of our own sexual needs and desires can bring about. Following is just a very short list of some of those damages:

• Very often, unhappiness and a sense of not having succeeded on the part of any spouse caught up in a marriage to a "Sti-flexual" partner (divorce is often the outcome).

• Frequently, lack of closeness and connection between the "Sti-flexual" parent and his / her children, if any.

• In most cases there is the despair and sense of non-worth which can, for years, smolder within the "Sti-flexual" (even suicide has been a drastic result).

• Violence (often fatal) by one or more persons against an individual(s).

• Lastly in situations like this, successful attempts at "Making it Right" or "Making up for Lost Time" are rarely achieved...or come far too late. So ask yourself after viewing this film -- Has Harry succeeded in doing so....or hasn't he?

If you learn nothing else from this film, take away this: What will ALWAYS stay with a someone like Harry is the ever hurting realization that this lost part of his (maybe Our) life has become just a throwaway....instead of a sweet and wonderful what-might-have-been. YET, can there still be REAL happiness in this kind of a man's future? Perhaps....perhaps. And in this regard, there is a based-on-true-life motion picture story of just such a salvation, now making its way through the new releases circuit. Aaahh, so perhaps all potential, and real, Harrys should be making their way to see this big-star, and likely award winning film, titled, "BEGINNERS."

Thanks, Harry, the trip's been fun!

(( PS--So, has this movie been talking about only Harry....or perhaps Me....or perhaps You, as well? ))

****

The reviews here are splendid, articulate, fair and respectful. I simply wanted to add how, at the close of the film, clever the screenwriter broadened the flashbacks to the young Kagan and the young Sweeney. We know there's a shower encounter that causes Kagan to be outed as gay but we are made curious by how Sweeney is involved and how the film shows more and more details about Sweeney as if his own memory is allowing the truth to become conscious. I thought it especially heart- wrenching when we see the young Kagan and young Sweeney playing a duet at Kagan's grand piano in his elegant home. I had not heard of this film and was merely browsing YouTube. I chose it from its title without noting it was a full movie. I could not stop watching.