Review: Vendetta

The harrowing, shameful true story of the largest lynching in American history…the lynching of several Italian immigrants. Set in 1890s Louisiana, businessman Sam Houston (Christopher Walken) wants control of the dock businesses overseen by Macheca (Joaquim de Almeida). Two families of Italian immigrants currently run things; the Provenzano family operate the docks, while the Matrangas sell the goods. When Macheca proves unable to be bought, Houston conspires with the corrupt mayor (Kenneth Welsh) and racist political figure William Parkerson (Luke Askew, in one of his best turns) to turn the two families against one another. This results in a death and several of the local Italian community being framed for murder and conspiracy to commit. Alessandro Colla plays young, innocent Gaspare Marchesi who works with his family for the Matrangas and gets caught up in the whole mess. Meghan McChesney plays Gaspare’s Irish love interest. Clancy Brown plays the fair-minded local police chief, Bruce Davison and Edward Herrmann play attorneys on different sides, Daragh O’Malley is Davison’s fiery Irish colleague, Andrea di Stefano plays the foolish, treacherous Vincent Provenzano, with a wasted Richard Libertini as his father. George Martin is perfectly cast as the not especially sympathetic judge.

 

Some great character actors, a more than capable filmmaker, and a potentially fascinating true story seem like a can’t-miss prospect. Yet, this 1999 HBO TV movie from director Nicholas Meyer (“Time After Time”, “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan”, “Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country”) does narrowly miss, somehow. I’d say it’s partly because the main character is the least interesting person in the story and the lead actor is one of the least interesting members of the entire cast. Alessandro Colla doesn’t exactly give a bad performance in the lead, but he’s playing the least interesting character and doesn’t have the screen presence to stand out in a very large role. The aw-shucks, poor nice immigrant boy schtick just isn’t very compelling for someone on screen so often in the film. Co-star Megan McChesney meanwhile, makes you yearn for uber-bland Cameron Diaz in the otherwise excellent “Gangs of New York”, which is really saying something. Zero screen presence to speak of here, I’m not surprised to find she hasn’t got any other IMDb credits. It makes for some eye-rolling, corny, and unconvincing scenes early on between the two. I may be too harsh here but I genuinely believe the performances of most of the lesser-name actors in the cast are the chief reason this film is forgotten today. Those early scenes featuring Colla’s naïve good boy schtick play like grade school theatre renditions of “Once Upon a Time in America” or “Gangs of New York”. Outside of that and a lot of unconvincing accents, the film actually pretty much works, if not quite as well as you think the subject matter demands. It might not be good enough to earn a recommendation, but it’s not too far off, which may make it all the more disappointing.

 

Andrea Di Stefano and especially Irish TV actor Daragh O’Malley come off best among the lesser-known names in the cast. The former adequately plays one of the most interestingly shaded characters, whilst the latter is easily the most convincingly accented person in the film and steals his every scene. O’Malley’s lively work is the closest this thing has to comic relief. The more widely familiar faces here are even better, with Clancy Brown (whose Irish accent is admittedly intermittent at best) and a thoroughly revolting Luke Askew particularly making their every moment on screen count. Christopher Walken probably isn’t in the film enough to justify his mug being front and centre on the poster, but is nonetheless despicably crafty and sly as the utterly selfish manipulator Houston. Joaquim de Almeida isn’t my favourite actor in the world, but he gives a solid performance playing a good guy for a change. Kenneth Welsh has been doing rock-solid work for decades in film and TV with little recognition or fanfare. He’s in fine form here playing a slimy, opportunistic politician. Edward Herrmann is dependable as ever in a thankless part, and Bruce Davison (with an OK Southern accent) comes into his own in the courtroom scenes as the defence attorney.

 

Knowing this is a true story of a lynching, there’s something of a feeling of nauseating dread as the court proceedings are carried out, knowing that it ends up the way that it does. People suck sometimes, they really do. It’s not an especially successful film, but I can’t deny that some of the moments in the finale are stirring and at times horrifying. It’s absolutely disgusting what Walken’s character and his scheming comrades cooked up here.

 

A lumpy near-miss that has a great true story that isn’t entirely convincing or greatly interesting in the telling. Boring leads and some unconvincing accents spoil things a bit too much. Several good supporting turns make this story about a different racial lynching watchable, if unpleasant. Still, the overall impression left is that this was a missed opportunity at something potentially substantial. I can see why this has been forgotten, perhaps someone should take another crack at this. Apparently quite faithfully based on the Richard Gambino book, the teleplay is by Timothy Prager (TV’s “Silent Witness”).

 

Rating: C+