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I used to pride myself on the fact that I'd seen pretty much every Robert De Niro movie ever made, save for a scant few made very early in his career that I couldn't, for the life of me, find anywhere. Of course, this was way before services like NetFlix and I lived in the middle of nowhere, so seeing as many as I did was really just luck. Now though, that stage of my life has passed. Sure, De Niro is still a great actor - probably one of the greatest - he just doesn't make good movies anymore. Aside from Shark Tale, I haven't seen his last four movies - "Godsend", "Analyze That", "City By The Sea" and "Showtime". Can you really blame me? So, getting back on topic, one of the movies that eluded me was "Hi, Mom", the sequel to "Greetings". And now, through the magic of DVD, I've added that notch to my belt.
I saw "Greetings" a few years ago on late night TV. It was one of those chance encounters where I couldn't sleep and started flipping through the channels - and there it was! And at the time, it was pretty funny. It follows a few friends - one of them is Jon Rubin (De Niro). He's a wannabe filmmaker/Peeping Tom who has one of the funnier moments I can remember on film when he's shipped off to Vietnam. So, in "Hi, Mom" Jon Rubin returns from Vietnam and continues his "art". He approaches a porn producer and gets funding for his idea - filming the people who live in the building across from him. Comedy follows.
However, one of the people he's filming is an activist. He's promoting a play titled "Be Black Baby" where white people can live the experience of being Black in America. And soon, we veer away from De Niro and into the life of this character. And it's at this point that the movie really loses focus. It's still an okay story - but just completely off base from where the movie was headed - and I wasn't really liking it - probably because it's billed as a De Niro movie, and he disappears for a good chunk of it.
By the time we do get back to Rubin, his filmmaking has gone limp. So instead, he gets in with "Be Black Baby". And again, the movie veers away from his character for a bit, focusing instead on the play. And the play itself is just wierd. I really made me have to look twice. By this time, Rubin is a full blown "Urban Guerilla", and in the final moments of the film, he carries out an atrocious (and funny depending how you look at it) act of urban terrorism.
The only extra available on this DVD is the film's original theatrical trailer.
The movie, from director Brian De Palma, is a look at the American counter-culture in the late 60s/early 70s. So maybe it's because I wasn't around back in the day that I really didn't "get" it. Overall, there were some funny moments, but nothing that would redeem the movie or make it worth watching outside of the De Niro factor.
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