Bring about change. This picture is remarkable primarily because it has not yet been a single review and it upsets me. It’s disappointing because it’s not the first James Belushi movie to have no reviews. I sometimes get the impression that some good actors are ignored by the audience in favor of famous actors. Actors, most of whom have two emotions for all occasions and a pretty face. I will not point my finger at these actors, as it is indecent, but they are and their number only increases from year to year. It is a pity the quantity, not the quality. Well, it's not about them today. Today we are going to talk about a film about corruption, the struggle for power and trying to change the world for the better, at least I hope so. So this is "Forget Palermo."
The story follows Carmine Banavia, a young politician who has set a lifelong goal of becoming mayor of New York City. And as his campaign, he chose the fight against drugs. The topic is relevant and painful for every American, and naturally Carmine knows it, and then shamelessly uses it. What? Oh, no, Carmine's not a bad person, he just knows the problems in the world, but he doesn't believe he can make a difference even as mayor. Belushi’s hero didn’t believe this until he met a young and enthusiastic journalist with an idealistic outlook on life, who proposed not just throwing dust in the eyes of voters, but legalizing drugs. It would solve a lot of problems and inflict a severe, if not fatal, wound on drug cartels. Carmine agrees to try and, under the pretext of a honeymoon, travels to his historic homeland in Palermo to look at what a city that lives on the drug trade and what people living there look like. Oh, it would be better if the hero Belushi went somewhere in Tahiti ...
Sounds intriguing, doesn't it? And that's what I thought when I sat down to watch this movie, but alas, the real world decided to give me another pig. Which is starting to make him a habit... It doesn't matter. So, with such an intriguing plot in the picture, virtually nothing happens and even despite such a strong cast, the main character of the picture is not James Belushi, as you might think, but the city of Palermo. A city in which kind and sympathetic people are ready to call you to the table, but as soon as you turn away, they immediately begin to whisper behind you and frown. A city where the road to monuments is dotted with disposable syringes, and young and underage girls look at you with absent eyes. This is a city where behind the joyful and carefree mask of a young man hides the angry face of an old man. Palermo is the city that grinds fate and the person who left this city will never be the same.
Well, again, everything sounds much more interesting than it really is. Perhaps the atmosphere is well conveyed here, or maybe because I don’t want to scold James Belushi’s films again, I don’t know. But the fact remains that there is too little action in the film and the timing of the picture is stretched to indecency. And the events that in any other film would have been within thirty minutes of screen time in this film are stretched by a hundred minutes. One hundred minutes of boredom for which the viewer does not even try to introduce the characters of the picture and make empathize with this or that character. And let these hundred minutes clouds over the head of Carmine Banavia thickened more and more, although the hero does not realize it, but the viewer does not show the main thing. The viewer is not shown harsh elderly people in business suits who would decide what to do with a cunning politician. Yes, the hanging shadow whose name the drug cartel feels over Palermo, but it actually does not show itself and that is bad. Because cinema is primarily art, and art should entertain the viewer, and not drive the latter into a state of lethargic sleep.
And the worst thing about our situation is that I can't recommend the film to the general public. No, it's a good movie. It has an idea and an attempt to fight the system, but the problem is that the film is boring enough to evoke any emotion. So I'd rather recommend the movie "The Right People" with Al Pacino, which raises the same questions, but it was done much more competently. As for Forget Palermo, let it remain buried in the sands of oblivion.
5 out of 10