The story traces the life of a gypsy boy from pre-conception through his
becoming King of the Gypsies in the New York area.
All eight of them.
Not much of a kingship. I guess he's not really the king of the gypsies so
much as the regional marketing manager for the New York office of Gypsy Scams International,
but those precise details wouldn't make for a very resonant film title.
And do the Big Apple Gypsies ever have a time getting those wagons into the
subway!
His mother is Susan Sarandon, and his grandfather, the previous King of the
Gypsies, is Sterling Hayden, and those parts of his life work well, other than
making him an outcast in mainstream society. What doesn't work for him at all
is his ne'er-do-well father (Judd Hirsch), whose abuse causes him to leave
home and abandon the gypsies for a period of time. When grandfather is near
death and names his grandson as his successor, the grandson has fateful
decisions to make.
The script is competent, and there is not a bad performance in the film.
Unfortunately, there is nothing fresh about the story of a kid who is
eventually forced to fulfill his birthright after growing up in, then seeming
to leave, a family criminal organization associated with a distinctive ethnic
minority group in New York, as immortalized in a 1970s movie.
It's essentially The Godfather with earrings.
If you are not familiar with our grading system, you need to
read the
explanation, because the grading is not linear. For example, by
our definition, a
C is solid and a C+ is a VERY good movie. There are very few Bs
and As. Based on our descriptive system, this film is a:
