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Day At The Beach

1998, Movie, NR, 93 mins

Day At The Beach: Review

DAY AT THE BEACH
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It's no walk in the park, either. This meandering and fatally disjointed debut from quadruple threat Nick Veronis -- who wrote, directed, produced and stars -- falls prey to the same combination of overambition and unwillingness to stick to essentials that derails so many first films. Here a single set of characters get involved in four different plots that don't so much intertwine as simply get in one another's way. Aspiring filmmaker -- what else? -- Jimmy (Veronis) has a day job at a New York City pasta shop. Tragedy strikes one afternoon, when a prop briefcase thrown from the bridge where Jimmy and his actor buddies (Neal Jones and Patrick Fitzgerald) are shooting a scene lands on a passing boat, killing a fisherman. That incident triggers plot one. Plot two revolves around Jimmy, pasta shop owner Augie (Ed Setrakian) and Augie's daughter Amy (Catherine Kellner). Jimmy has the hots for Amy, but Augie doesn't approve. Amy, meanwhile, is despondent over her mother's suicide. Plot three involves the pasta shop itself, which turns out to be a front for a mob-run money-laundering operation. Plot four doesn't kick in until after everyone piles into a car and impulsively drives out to the Hamptons, where they wind up holding the former owner of the pasta shop hostage. (Please don't ask how or why -- you're only in for more plot.) It's a miracle that any of this gets resolved at all, and perhaps Veronis deserves some credit for wrapping matters up in a more or less efficient fashion. But it's hardly satisfying: The movie is messy, nothing really jells and none of what you get from the experience (save a surprisingly good performance from Jones) seems worth the considerable effort of wading through it all. leave a comment --Ken Fox
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