Review Movie Norman the Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer
Review: Richard Gere equally 'Norman,' an Aspirational Fixer
- Norman
- NYT Critic's Option
- Directed by Joseph Cedar
- Drama, Thriller
- R
- 1h 58m
The full, spoilerish title of Joseph Cedar'southward new movie — "Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer" — is more or less literally authentic, though information technology might exist argued that "fixer" is a chip euphemistic, if not downright fantastical. In his own listen, Norman Oppenheimer, a well-dressed, well-spoken Manhattanite played with feeling and mischief past Richard Gere, is what's known in Yiddish as a macher. He travels the circuits of money and influence, always just a few capillaries removed from the chirapsia heart of ability. His mental Rolodex swells with the names of the good and the great, every one of them "a very close friend." He'd be happy to introduce you.
His declared friends — financiers, captains of manufacture, political big shots in Washington and Tel Aviv — might reckon things differently. A rising Israeli politician named Micha Eshel (Lior Ashkenazi) describes Norman to an aide every bit "a warm Jew." It's the nicest thing anyone can say. The adjutant, an actual logroller named Duby (Yehuda Almagor), has other ideas. In his eyes Norman is, at best, a small annoyance; at worst, a threat to his patron'south career.
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Information technology's no blow that some of Duby'due south words about Norman — "scheming" and "bloodsucking," in particular — evoke the historical linguistic communication of anti-Semitism. Mr. Cedar, a New York-born Israeli filmmaker, has a abrupt middle for intra-Jewish conflict, for the narcissism of large and pocket-sized differences that can cause the unity of God's chosen people to splinter like matzo. His previous moving-picture show, the sublime academic comedy "Footnote," mined father-son rivalry and scholarly antagonism for biblical pathos and borscht belt humor. "Norman" traces fault lines, more cultural and temperamental than ideological or religious, between the members of the diaspora (or at to the lowest degree the New York fly of it) and their cousins in the Promised Land.
One of Mr. Cedar's slyest conceptual jokes — and ane of his boldest provocations at a moment of controversy most race and ethnicity in movie casting — is to place non-Jewish actors in most of the major American Jewish roles. (The Israelis are more often than not Israeli, with the exception of Charlotte Gainsbourg, an ethereal apotheosis of ethical seriousness and geographical nomadism.) In addition to Mr. Gere (who has never been better), there is Michael Sheen every bit Norman's nephew. Steve Buscemi plays a rabbi. Information technology would be a pleasure to write that sentence fifty-fifty if the performance information technology designates were not a marvel of wit and off-kilter humanity.
Which pretty much describes "Norman" itself. It'due south only afterwards the plot has unfolded, with caper elegance and brazen unpredictability, that the risks involved go apparent. The dangers are everywhere: overly wide humour; obnoxiously shticky performances; sentimental tribalism; piece of cake moral betoken-scoring. None materialize. It'due south startling, given how much farce is on brandish — in the ascension-and-autumn structure of the narrative; in the madcap scenes of narrowly missed (or fully achieved) catastrophe; in the play of mistaken and forged identities — how much genuine feeling also comes through.
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transcript
transcript
Movie Review: 'Norman'
The Times critic A.O. Scott reviews "Norman."
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In "Norman" a logroller played by Richard Gere tries to save his reputation by connecting with an Israeli political leader. In his review A.O. Scott writes: filmmaker Joseph Cedar has a sharp middle for intra-Jewish conflict, for the narcissism of large and minor differences that can crusade the unity of God's chosen people to splinter like matzo. It'south merely after the plot has unfolded, with antic elegance and brazen unpredictability, that the risks involved become credible. It'southward startling, given how much farce is on display — in the rise-and-fall structure of the narrative; in the madcap scenes of narrowly missed (or fully accomplished) ending; in the play of mistaken and forged identities — how much genuine feeling also comes through.
It'southward less that Mr. Cedar blends realism with absurdity than that he refuses to acknowledge whatever distinction between them. Norman, who strides through Midtown in a tweed cap and a camel coat, connected to the earth through the earbuds of his iPhone, is an utterly plausible citizen of a city on the movement. He is also a about mythical figure, a animate being sprung from the annals of Jewish literature. You will encounter his ilk — losers, strivers, hucksters and dreamers — in the novels of Saul Bellow and the stories of Franz Kafka and Isaac Bashevis Singer. Too in the films of Mel Brooks and the Coen Brothers. At one point, Norman meets his own double, in the shambolic person of Hank Azaria.
Strictly speaking, Norman is a con artist, a spinner of exaggerations, half-truths and outright lies. This may be the source of Micha'southward affection for him: This future prime number minister can produce his share of seductive rhetorical vapor, and the men also share an evident and endearing insecurity. They want to be liked, to matter not just in public affairs just to the people around them, too.
And there is something virtually selfless in Norman'south hustle. He doesn't want wealth or power as much as he longs for proximity to them, for entree into a earth where important things happen. He calls himself a businessman or a consultant, simply he is actually running a kind of social pyramid scheme, promising extravagant returns on small investments of kindness and courtesy.
He almost succeeds. Or maybe — to give away as lilliputian equally I can — he does succeed. Just at the very end, with thrilling subtlety and impressive clarity, does a fable bloom from the satirical earth. To put it another fashion: This is a rare Jewish joke in which the punch line lives up to the commitment.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/13/movies/norman-review-richard-gere.html
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