Cicro

THE GANG THAT COULDN'T SHOOT STRAIGHT

Directed by JAMES GOLDSTONE

Screenplay by WALDO SALT

You don't have to be Italian to hate The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight, although that gives you a distinct edge. The movie's febrile witlessness easily transcends all ethnic boundaries and comes guaranteed to outrage virtually everybody.

Italians, however, might--perhaps ought--to take special offense. Jimmy Breslin's comic novel recorded the exploits of a sad-sack mob of Brooklyn hoods with good-humored scorn. Waldo Salt's chaotic script turns Breslin's characters, which were already caricatures, into vicious racial stereotypes. Everyone is either venal, murderous, retarded or deformed; and since they are almost all Italians, one might be tempted to conclude that everyone whose ancestors were born between Sicily and Milan is a feeble-minded racketeer.

The actors, who were apparently given their heads, perform in an assortment of styles that range from self-parody to self-abuse. Jerry Orbach makes the most soporific leading man since Sonny Tufts, and the grandiose incompetence of Jo Van Fleet as the foul-mouthed Big Momma would be hard to equal. However, Robert De Niro, as a kleptomaniacal bicycle racer, and Leigh Taylor-Young as his perennially startled paramour, somehow manage to bring a small degree of charm and reality to the lamentable goings on.

qedJ.C.

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