LOVE THE HARD WAY
Reviewed by: Harvey S. Karten Grade:B Kino International Directed by: Peter Sehr Written by: Marie Noelle, Peter Sehr, from a novel by Wang Shuo Cast: Adrien Brody, Charlotte Ayanna, Jon Seda, August Diehl, Pam Grier, Katherine Moennig Screened at: Review 1, NYC, 5/29/03
Contrary to the urban legend, opposites do not attract, but try telling that to Alan. Alan was my roommate in sophomore year of college, guy who often found himself date-less on weekends. "Aw, Harvey," he'd exclaim more often than either of us found beneficial, "I'm a nice guy studying toward my goal and when I go out I make sure the car is washed and my shoes are shined. But I can't get a second date. I look around and every nice- looking, clean-cut girl I see is going out with the guy who fixes cars at the garage. Or pumps gas. Or does nothing all day except lift weights."
Well, maybe not every clean-cut girl, but though you won't usually find candidates for advanced degrees in biochemistry marrying the local bowling-alley champs, some women are just plain attracted to the muscular fellows who don't wash their cars before meeting them and whose shoes remain stained with grease from the last Beamer whose oil they changed.
Who can figure? Love is not a science and if you don't believe that, take in Peter Sehr's "Love the Hard Way," which has the gritty look of a noir escapade given its South Bronx- Canal Street locations but can more accurately be called the still-unrecognized Beatnik Genre.
"Love the Hard Way" is an exploration of an affair between a small-time thief, Jack (Adrien Brody) and his unlikely new girl friend, Claire (Charlotte Ayanna). Jack, who tells Claire he slept with 200 women (but remains envious of Wilt Chamberlain who topped his record by a factor of 100), makes a good living as a thief and probably lives in the South Bronx because he fits in with the grit of that dilapidated nabe. On a typical day he'd work with his buddies Charlie (Jon Seda), Jeff (August Diehl) and a tall, sinewy woman in a prostitution scam, while by contrast Claire would maintain her straight A average as a bio major in an ivy league school (read: Columbia U.). Though Claire is from Venus and Jack from Mars, their first meeting at a trendy Manhattan movie theater is a big success because Jack, who must have been named for his favorite author, Kerouac, spends his leisure hours writing pulp fiction, his bad-boy image sweeping the poor gal off her feet. (Hear that, Alan?) Since Jack had more in mind than touching Claire's knee-though desiring not too much more than a one-night stand he stands her up on a date and proceeds to ignore her desperate need to be with him.
Anyone who has gone to an upscale college should be able to identify with Claire, a young woman who is probably more sexually liberated than the typical college girl of the 1950s and yet who has the Doris-Day, girl-next-door image. That identification established, we find her fatal-attraction descent into scuzzy things disturbing. We can't be blamed for wanting her either to realize her incompatibility and move on with her effete, appropriately-named boyfriend Fitzgerald or, even better, to have Jack see the self-destructiveness of disposing of women who truly care for him, to give up his scam, and get on with his literary talents coupled with a more humdrum domestic existence. "Love the Hard Way" is backed up by some cute side roles, particularly that of Pam Grief in the guise of Linda Fox, a detective determined to catch Jack and his good friend Charlie during the commission of a crime. Charlotte Ayanna is adorable, blue-tinted contact lenses adding glitter to her expressive eyes while Adrien Brody more involved with exercising the penis than the keys as a pianist is a stand-out, hair flying in all directions while his confused ego seeks stability.
The film is inspired by a work of the prolific Chinese novelist Wang Shuo who is noted in his own land for writing about a wide range of people now being transformed by the rise of capitalism in the land of Mao and Sun.
"Love the Hard Way" may challenge credibility, given how far both the academic femme and the scamming gent get their lives turned way, way around, but think of where love got Adele Hugo in Francois Truffaut's "L'histoire d' Adele H" or Alex Forrest in Adrian Lyne's "Fatal Attraction." Love makes the world go round, at least sometimes. But occasionally it can make people stop the world and spin it topsy-turvy out-of-control.
Not Rated. 104 minutes. Copyright 2003 by Harvey Karten at Harveycritic@cs.com
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