The big cities of the world are like rough gemstones. Only a person familiar with a particular city would understand its quirks and charms that a mere tourist would miss or under-appreciate. Some people fall in love with the charms and quirks of these cities with such a passion that they dream of living there or traveling there. London and Tokyo are my personal favorites, but everyone in the world loves New York City.
Movies about the Big Apple are bountiful. Cinematic valentines romanticizing New York's charms often gloss over the grit that some people love. Gritty, true life films often strike fear into the innocent hearts of the dreamers that would fall in love with New York.
New York, I Love You is a collection of short stories and vignettes about love in New York. Featuring a cast full of well-known actors, the stories weave in and out like a video scrapbook. True to the character of New York City, the stories are a bit disjointed. There is a lot of jumping around between the different stories. Much like walking down the street and wondering if you'll see that person again, you find yourself wondering if you'll get to see more of one story. SPOILER ALERT: One of the things I find that bugs me is when there's no closure for a storyline. Most of the storylines are open ended. It bugs me, but then again, I respect the realistic approach of life not having closure.
Among my favorite stories, Cloris Leachman and Eli Wallach as an elderly married couple nagging each other as they walk down the street, Orlando Bloom as a musician and Christina Ricci as his boss' assistant, and Anton Yelchin as the boy going to prom with his pharmacist's (James Caan) daughter.
New York, I Love You is rated R for language and sexual content. Not only is there sex depicted, but there are graphic descriptions of sex in the dialogue. This movie is definitely not for the young teens. I'm not sure if this would even be a good date night movie. I give New York, I Love You 3 yellow taxis out of 5. |
