Review of Little Odessa (1994) by Michael S — 26 Dec 2016

Joshua Shapira (Tim Roth), a cold-blooded professional killer, returns to his Brighton Beach boyhood home for a "job." He knows it will be difficult to return to the Russian-immigrant community of his youth--in his eyes, we see anticipation of the inevitable emotional pain and psychic turmoil that seeing his forsaken family and estranged companions will bring him. To do his job, and try to maintain some semblence of sanity, he has had to wall off his humanity from even himself. Seeing his kid brother Reuben (Edward Furlong), who adores him, talking with his dying mother Irina (Vanessa Redgrave), who still loves him, and yes, arguing with his abusive father Arkady (Maximilian Schell), begins to wreak havoc with his personal defenses. As his steely demeanor begins to dissolve, we are shown the soul of a hit-man crumbling away, piece by piece. Finally, all that he now allows himself to admit that he loves is agonizingly torn away from him and he is left with the ultimate punishment for his transgressions...

"Little Odessa" was written and directed by James Gray, in his directorial debut. The film earned a Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival and the prestigious Grand Prix of the Belgian Film Critics Association. It also earned admiration from French master Claude Chabrol. The storyline in "Little Odessa" with a dysfunctional family in the centre is not something new, but the approach to use Brighton Beach, known for its high population of Russian-speaking immigrants, as the focal point in the film makes "Little Odessa" stand out. I have wanted to see this film for a long time, but in the end I was still not fully happy. Yes, it was James Gray´s directorial debut, and you can see that as the editing is not 100% for example. Some scenes makes no sense and there´s no good flow in the film in my opinion. Tim Roth, Edward Furlong, Maximilian Schell, Moira Kelly and Vanessa Redgrave are all great, but there´s something missing for this bleak, cold and gritty thriller to be something more than a 3 out of 5 in my book. Trivia: Great quote by Tim Roth´s character Joshua: "We'll wait 10 seconds and see if God saves you" when he is about to make a hit.