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In my continuing quest to postpone the
completion of the several papers I have due, I watched The
Flaming Kid today.
If you haven't seen this little gem, check it
out. Garry Marshall's debut in feature film directing remains his
best, even if Pretty Woman made more money.
Set in 1963, Matt Dillon plays a teenage kid
from Brooklyn from a solid working-class family, headed by Hector
Elizondo as his loving, if volatile, father. He gets a job
parking cars at the tony Flamingo Club, and starts a summer
romance with a pretty, college girl (Janet Jones, before the
world knew her as the Thief of Gretsky) who doesn't mind his
humble roots and invites him to her uncle's house for dinner.
There he meets Phil Brody (Richard Crenna, who
is marvellous), a self-made man, brilliant gin-rummy player, and
very much in need of a kid to idolize him--his wife and daughter
are unimpressed. Dillon falls under his spell, gets upgraded to
cabana boy, and starts spouting his new hero's wisdom to his
father. And it goes from there.
While the story itself is pretty basic, the
script and the cast are remarkable, particularly the three leads.
This is probably Elizondo's and Crenna's best work, and Dillon is
damn near always the most natural actor going. The story never
falters, never tiptoes anywhere near sentiment--and somehow
manages to make gin-rummy interesting, to boot.
Kids will like it, too.
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