“YEAH”

By Raymond Benson

It’s the most-heard response from Jack Nicholson’s character, Charley Partanna: “Yeah.” Does he swear a blood oath to Don Corrado Prizzi (William Hickey) for life? “Yeah.” Does he want to “do it” on the Oriental [rug] with Maerose Prizzi (Anjelica Huston)? “Yeah.” Does he want to get married to Irene Walker (Kathleen Turner), an assassin who may or may not be working against his own family? “Yeah.”

Is Prizzi’s Honor an amazing, acerbic black comedy that surprises you at every turn? “YEAH!”

It was director John Huston’s swan song, his last film to be released while he was alive (Huston’s final movie, The Dead, was released a few months after his death in 1987). Prizzi picked up Oscar nominations for Best Picture, Director, Actor (Nicholson), Supporting Actor (Hickey), Adapted Screenplay (by Richard Condon, adapted from his novel, with Janet Roach), Costumes, and Editing. The picture won none of those, but Anjelica Huston snatched the award for Supporting Actress for her role. Allegedly she had to fight to get the part, even with her father directing and her boyfriend (Nicholson, at the time) starring.

Prizzi’s Honor is a gangster film with black comedy at its heart. While it’s an engrossing crime picture with colorful and eccentric mobster characters, it is Nicholson’s performance, the absurdity of the “family” life, and the screwball comedy sensibility of the plot that bring an unusual hilarity to the proceedings.

Nicholson plays Charley as a stereotypical Italian New Yorker who, in speech, sounds as if he’s missing a cannoli or two—but don’t let his manner fool you. This guy is smart like a fox, and as deadly as a viper. It’s why he’s the Partanna family’s number one hitman. Nicholson’s characterization is brilliant; it is surely one of his most memorable screen appearances. Irene Walker, who is assuredly not Italian, is also shrewd and dangerous. Turner is also excellent in the part, and she was robbed of a nomination that year. Theirs is a match made, well, certainly not in heaven.

Don Prizzi, now a really old man who also retains a canny mind, controls the family business through his two sons, Eduardo (Robert Loggia) and Dominic (Lee Richardson), and close advisor Angelo Partanna (John Randolph), Charley’s “pop.” Maerose is Dominic’s daughter, and she was once involved with Charley. Unfortunately, she left him from some schmuck, embarrassed the family, and was disowned. Now she’s trying to get back in good graces with the Prizzis, and at the same time snare Charley away from his new-found love, Irene.

Throw in some contract killings and kidnappings with the love story, and you have a mobster movie like no other. Huston’s work is masterful as he handles the violence and comedy with a confidence we hadn’t seen from the filmmaker in some time. When repetitive shots of a passenger airplane traveling west, then east, west, and east again elicit laughter, then you know you’re in the right hands.

Kino Lorber’s new high definition restoration looks fine, but Andrzej Bartkowiak’s cinematography is soft and warm, coming across here a bit grainy. There are English subtitles for the hearing impaired, and an optional audio commentary by film historians Howard S. Berger and Nathaniel Thompson. Unfortunately, there are no supplements other than theatrical trailers for this and other Kino Lorber releases.

Easily one of the audience favorites of the 1980s, Prizzi’s Honor made Anjelica Huston’s career, kept Jack Nicholson in top star status, and gave John Huston a final bow with magnificent acclaim.

Highly recommended? Yeah.

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