The movie takes place in City Island, a small fishing village in the Bronx. The story revolves around a correction’s officer named Vince Rizzo (Andy Garcia), the co-head of a family so dysfunctional you start wondering what makes yours so terrible. He has an emotional landmine as his wife- Joyce (Julianna Marguiles); a snarky, hormonally evolving teenage son – Vince jr. (Ezra Miller), and the college girl secretly turned stripper – Vivian (Dominik Garcia-Lorido).
Vince’s opening monologue is up front and honest about the film’s theme; secrets. Everyone has them, and everyone has that one deep secret, the secret that could change lives, and everyone in the Rizzo family has their own. Vivian hasn’t told her family about losing her college scholar ship and turning to stripping to pay for her education. Vince jr. hasn’t told anyone about his fetish for big, plump women and his infatuation with the big, bodacious beauty across the street. Joyce hasn’t told Vince that she doesn’t believe him when he says he’s going to playing poker, and that’s because Vince is not playing poker – he’s attending acting classes. And no one in the family is willing to confess to anyone else in the family that they smoke.
Vince’s desire to become an actor is not his big secret. One day at work he notices a convict in his mid-twenties with a familiar last name – Tony Nardella – and immediately Vince knows exactly who Tony (Steven Strait) is. Tony is the son Vince abandoned a different lifetime ago, before Tony was ever born, and whom he has never told anyone in his family about. Tony’s eligibility for parole requires that he be released to a family member, but the only family he knew was an abusive mother – the pregnant, psychotic lover that Vince left all those years ago, and she has since died. Vince decides to assume responsibility for Tony’s release and takes him home, convincing him that he’s there only to help Vince build a bathroom in the boatshed for his wife.
Soon, after witnessing outlandish arguments amongst the family, and discovering everyone’s secrets, Tony starts thinking that life in prison wasn’t half as bad as being stuck with these people.
Emily Mortimer plays Tanya, Vince’s acting partner, motivator, and sole confidante who has a secret of her own that she will share with Vince, but only at the right time. The always entertaining Alan Arkin has a small role as the acting coach Michael Malakov and aside from verbally bashing Vince’s favorite actor, Marlon Brando, he is really underused, but considering the story was trying to tell – it may have been a struggle to fit him in anywhere else.
City Island is a funny, passionate, emotional rollercoaster ride from beginning to end. You see the Rizzo’s marriage falling apart bit by bit, and with Tony now involved in their lives you understand what could happen and even if it does happen you still find yourself laughing at the whole situation. With the two children, most of the time you feel like slapping them but at least Vince jr. comes back with humor and shows his weak link when it comes to talking to the kinds of girls he prefers – Vivian comes across as more of a dying fish that’s beached on the ocean. She just needs to be picked up and tossed back in order to be alright, but the scene at the dinner table discussing her curiously, still-enlarging chest parts is gut-busting. And this is the most that I have enjoyed Andy Garcia in a very long time. His comedic timing is excellent while shifting between dramatic moments at the drop of a hat. Great acting combined with a meaningful, well-told story make City Island worthwhile viewing.
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