Low-key, life-sized little indie, adapted from Gerald Shapiro's Bad Jews and Other Stories, marks the feature directing debut of Peter Riegert, the likable leading man (if more often a supporting man) of such cherishables as Local Hero and Crossing Delancey. He is the leading man here as well, and still likable, as a too-nice travelling pitchman ("Why do I have to be the prick? I don't want to be the prick"), showing the ropes to a young corporate backstabber while test-marketing a telephone voice-transformer for making timorous old ladies sound like Gregory Peck. In his home life, he has to contend with a prodding Italian wife (well, Isabella Rossellini, anyway), a typical handful of a teenage daughter (Ashley Johnson), and a shrinking father in a wheelchair out in Arizona (Eli Wallach: "Another six months, I'll be the size of a peanut"). The protagonist goes a bit off the rails after running into the object of his old high-school crush (Beverly D'Angelo), and takes the film with him. An off-the-cuff funeral oration gets him, and it, back on track. With Jake Hoffman, Rita Moreno, Eric Bogosian. (2005) — Duncan Shepherd
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