I have never particu larly warmed to Andy Garcia as an actor — he always seems to be trying way too hard — but he is quite wonderful as the head of a wildly dysfunctional Bronx family in Raymond De Felitta’s uproariously funny “City Island.”
Garcia’s accent may waver, but he’s entirely relaxed and ingratiating as Vince Rizzo, a corrections officer and family man with a couple of whopping secrets.
The first is that Tony (Steven Strait), the hunky prisoner he’s brought home for a month to work on a home-improvement project, is the product of a long-ago fling with the 20-something’s deceased mother.
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Vince’s long-suffering spouse (an excellent Julianna Margulies) is also unaware her hubby has secretly been taking acting lessons — hiding his copy of “An Actor Prepares” in his bathroom along with his cigarettes.
He’s hardly the only one in the family doing something on the sly.
Their sexy daughter (played by Garcia’s real-life offspring, Dominik Garcia-Lorido) has secretly flunked out of college and is working as a stripper, complete with a set of new breast implants.
Their son has a sexual fetish involving overweight women that he indulges by watching an older neighbor.
Because he’s unaware Vince is actually his father, Tony is initially bemused by all these goings-on.
But he’s hardly innocent, especially when his flirtations with the sexually frustrated woman he doesn’t realize is his stepmother ends up in a make-out session at Orchard Beach.
De Felitta, who directed the wonderful “Two Family House” (2000), has a great feel for New York City’s further reaches and a very sure hand with actors.
He also has the discipline necessary to pull off a farce like this one, where everyone’s dirty laundry gets hung out to dry in a climactic scream-fest.
The excellent cast also includes Emily Mortimer as Tony’s acting classmate, who would like to be more than his scene partner, and Alan Arkin as their teacher, who delivers a hilarious diatribe against Method acting.
For me, the movie’s high point comes when Tony auditions for a role in a Martin Scorsese movie.
Tony learns not to try so hard — a lesson that Garcia also seems to have absorbed from “City Island.”