Virgo V
Little Odessa is a 1994 American crime drama film directed and written by James Gray, in his directorial debut and starring Tim Roth, Edward Furlong, Moira Kelly, Maximilian Schell and Vanessa Redgrave.
The title is a reference to Brighton Beach, a community in Brooklyn nicknamed "Little Odessa."
Little Odessa 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 New Wave filmmaker Claude Chabrol.
Little Odessa is a crime drama film that received positive reviews for its direction, acting and themes.
Direction
Some say James Gray's debut film was a stunning achievement, with impressive control over the actors and a haunting mood.
Others say the film was carefully staged and had effective dramatic beats.
Acting
Some say Vanessa Redgrave gave a superb performance and that Maximilian Schell and Tim Roth were also excellent.
Others say Tim Roth gave his finest performance to date.
Themes
Some say the film is a Dostoyevskian examination of tainted morality.
Others say it's a dark, spare piece that explores family and fate.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
01/10/25
Full Review
Dusan T
A story about loneliness and love. A successful depiction of claustrophobia that the Russian section of Brighton Beach was at the time.
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
01/15/24
Full Review
Alec B
You can see brief flashes of potential brilliance, but the fact that none of them amount to anything only makes the film more disappointing. Also, I hope that whoever was the boom mic operator for this never worked again.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
11/10/23
Full Review
Audience Member
This was a 1990s crime film I skipped at the time, but now wanted to go back to watch after greatly enjoying writer/director James Gray's more recent film "The Lost City of Z." In this film Tim Roth plays a hitman for the Russian Mob returning home to Little Odessa, a primarily Russian Neighborhood in New York City, but the main focus is on his younger brother Edward Furlong and the brothers' relationship to each other and their parents, Vanessa Redgrave as the terminally ill mother and Maximilian Schell as the caring father. Although there is a crime story about the mafia going after Roth, at it's core "Little Odessa" is a dark family melodrama. Much like "The Lost City of Z," writer/director Gray creates rich characters with strong performances (Moira Kelly is also quite good as Roth's girlfriend). Both films also similar present a terrific sense of place, that's reminiscent of the works of Herzog or Wim Wenders, where the setting and locations play almost as important a role in the film as the story and characters. An unfortunate similarity between the two films is a slow meandering pace. A major strike against "Little Odessa" is that I'm not quite sure of the film's subtext or central theme. There's likely something about family, but whatever point Gray had in mind gets obscured by subplots and melodrama. Still, despite the film's slow pace and lack of clear purpose, it's visually arresting, features strong performances, and paints a vivid picture of what it's like to live and breath in Little Odessa. Deeply flawed, but well worth watching.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/31/23
Full Review
Audience Member
One of those little indies that I remember hearing about when I was in high school. On its face it's appealing: a hitman comes back to his old hood for a job and tries to reconnect with his family. It has a nice cast. But the characters are thinly drawn and the tone of the film is so unrelentingly somber that it ends up being lifeless.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
01/27/23
Full Review
Audience Member
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.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/21/23
Full Review
Read all reviews
>
