Customer Reviews

Fingers [VHS]

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The principal difference between MEAN STREETS and FINGERS is that the focus in FINGERS is exclusively on the character played by Mr Keitel and his relationship with his father (mainly) and his mother, and his search for a partner who will give expression to his sexual longings. The maintenance of tone throughout the film by Mr Toback is superb. He also does not rush and cross cut scenes - he allows the inherent momentum of the scene to develop at the pace of the characters conversation, reactions and interactions. The location shooting is vivid and relevant. The sex and violence are also dramatically relevant and quite powerful, but the macho world may be offensive to a modern perspective where women are treated as compliant , and sometimes not so compliant, sex objects. Just one memorable scene: Jimmy informs his mother that his piano audition did not go so well. His mother stares, squints, scrunches up her face and turns to the wall, utters no words but speaks volumes. In another scene his father tells him he should have been strangled at birth. Jimmy takes out his rage in a number of ways.
Well worth owning. Good Bach piano too.

In all my years of movie viewing, there have been only two movies that I completely hated upon my first viewing: James Toback's FINGERS and David Lynch's BLUE VELVET. To me, the former was a 90-minute exercise in incompetence, with the director wallowing in material unfit for a sewer. The latter was indescribable - an eclectic assortment of unrelated images sewn together by momentary fits of brutal and sexual savagery. I never would have thought that my utter lack of understanding in film as a visual language would soon come to pass, and ultimately permit me to enjoy further viewings of these films which have become two of my all-time favorites.

FINGERS is one of the best movies you've more than likely never heard of. Though I found it to be initially revolting, I gave the film another chance and boy am I glad I did. Watching the film a second time revealed one of the most audacious and best films made in the 1970's. Harvey Keitel gives what to me is his best film performance. As Jimmy Angelleli (an Angel in Hell - nice symbolism!), he's an aspiring concert pianist moonlighting as a collector for his loan shark father, played wonderfully by the late Michael V. Gazzo. The predominantly New York City cast is made up primarily of great character actors from THE GODFATHER films, in particular Dominic Chianese (finally getting recognition on THE SOPRANOS) and Lenny Montana. Tony Sirico, who plays Pauly Walnuts on THE SOPRANOS, is terrific as a gangster who has a nasty scuffle in a stairwell with Keitel. Danny Aiello and Ed Marinaro are great as Sirico's henchmen, and Tanya Roberts(!) plays Sirico's girlfriend. Marian Seldes is excellent in her small role as Keitel's mother. Tom Signorelli is great as a convict sharing a cell with Keitel. Jim Brown rounds out the cast as Dreems, and Tisa Farrow plays his fey girlfriend.

Be warned, however - FINGERS is not for everyone. It is at times a brutal and depressing drama. However, you should give it a chance if you like MEAN STREETS and TAXI DRIVER, as these are the films that come to mind while watching FINGERS.

The film was shot by cinematographer Michael Chapman, a master of some great 1970's films like THE LAST DETAIL, TAXI DRIVER, and RAGING BULL. His camera mastery is brilliant here. This, like THE FRENCH CONNECTION, is a highly visceral New York movie.

James Toback deserves kudos for making an uncompromising film. For a directorial debut, it's a stunning achievement, and it's the sort of film that would never get made today. Superb.

Many times over the years James Toback has been referred to as `brilliant', and a good deal of those times the film `Fingers' is mentioned in the same sentence.

It stands right there with Resevoir Dogs, Bad Lieutenant, and Mean Streets-all Harvey Keitel films which have over the years gotten far more applause than they did earlier..

Actually the premise is just enough unique: the concert pianist from the wrong side of the tracks, the carefree and confused collector for his bookie father.

Toback's dialogue is very raw, but it is on target for the very raw world he describes.

Michael Gazzo gives one of his best performances ever as Keitel's father.

Not to be missed, but if you look to Toback to recreate this magic with his later efforts, `The Pick-Up Artist" or "Exposed", don't waste your time. Even his recent "Two Girls and a Guy" might have been "Two Mil Down the Drain" without the superb performance of Robert Downey Jr.

James Toback is quoted as telling Harvey Keitel in the Beverly Hills Hotel in 1977 that Keitel "was born to do Fingers." Toback was right; Keitel delivers a first-rate performance that is arguably his best ever, alongside his work in Mean Streets and Bad Lieutenant. This story is about mental anguish derived from perfectionism; Keitel tries to please his mobster father and his high-strung(describing his mother at best)pianist mother and fails, causing him to fall deeper and deeper into a brewing vat of psychosis. He can find no love from his parents; to satisfy his hunger for love, he becomes fixated on a call girl named Carol (an excellent performance by Tisa Farrow)who he can never have. The rejection of him by his mother, the death of his father, and the loss of Carol combine to push Keitel's character, Jimmy Angelelli, over the edge. Keitel is the father of method acting; his ability to apply the pain he has suffered in real-life situations to scenes in films strengthens the impact of the story once it is told. It's important to remember that this man was praised by Jack Nicholson, a multiple Oscar Winner, as "the best actor I've [Nicholson] ever worked with." This film bombed at the box office; it only played for a few weeks and prior to VHS proliferation in the mid 80s, only hard-core film buffs would have seen this. The film was a failure primarily because Keitel was never taken seriously by Hollywood as a leading man. Hollywood producers only ever saw the young Italian hood Charlie Cappa from Mean Streets when they saw Keitel. If you like stories about tormented characters, Keitel provides an Oscar-caliber performance. Of course, this clashes with Hollywood's view on Keitel, but let me leave you with the following truism: There is no such thing as meritocracy in acting; connections, not talent, make stars. This is why Keitel's career was dead from the making of Fingers until his comeback in the early 90s with Bugsy, Bad Lieutenant, and Reservoir Dogs.

In James Toback's forgotten 1978 masterpiece, actor Harvey Keitel givesone of his greatest performances as avolatile young man who aspires to be aconcert pianist. However, he works as adebt-collector for his ailing,loan sharkfather. We follow this dark loner downhis path of dark obsessions and into therealm of madness as he falls deeper intohis father's violent world of mobsters,and as he develops an ever increasingfascination with a hooker.Taking its cuefrom films like "Taxi Driver", this filmis so lurid that yu can't stop watching.And it has an ending that will knock youinto the middle of next week.Keitel istruly electrifying here, and if you'rein the mood for a dark study in obsession,this film is perfect for you!

The intensity and range of emotion projected by Harvey Keitel in this film are nothing short of incredible. Like James Woods, Keitel is able to so convincingly and powerfully suffuse a role with emotion that the viewer feels drained but grateful after the film's final scene has faded from the screen.

FINGERS (1977) is not a traditional horror movie, as in the genre,
but in the reaction that is imparted to the audience, as the action
unfolds over 90 minutes, with Keitel trying to pull himself out of
his station in life, as a collector of illegal debts that went bad
despite showing an innate talent in collections.

He tries to make the leap forward to a professional pianist, hoping
to perform at the famous Carnegie Hall one day. Unfortunately, the
character finds out there's a lot of hard work, practice in addition
to the necessary talent (something already taken for granted) and
competition to beat before attaining that special status.

The lesson of this movie, is the danger of embracing the darkness,
losing one's humanity, and vulnerability when violent, horrible deeds
are done, that take the yin and the yang out of balance. We see
Keitel's character weep, as he attends an after hours party, and the
owner expects Keitel and several ladies to perform sexually in the
presence of others, without privacy, or doing a menage a
trois. Keitel's role, shies away for various reasons, if not only
from the shame, as do the ladies as well.

Here, Keitel reprises his role, of someone who puts on his "diving
suit" and goes into the depths of estrangement, cruelty, dispair
violence, as a result of employing extreme "business tactics"
expected to in certain mob circles to avoid being
ridiculed, exploited, or run out of business, involving collection
debts of gambling, business loans, protection fees, etc

The merit of this picture, is the simplicity of the dialog, and often
the superb cinematographic quality of the wide-screen picture,
bursting with color, sharpness, vividness, showing an extremely
"live" feeling to the action, even 30 years later, amazingly. The
aging of the movie, is not perceived so easily, except for the dated
automobiles, and lack of cleanliness of the streets.

There are, of course, the token "eye candy" young ladies, played by
Tisa Farrow, and Tanya Roberts, shown at a swimming pool, relaxing,
giving Keitel an opportunity to change gears.

The protagonist, focused on his aspiring career as a pianist, is
estranged partly for that reason, and acts bizarrely, by carrying a
portable mini-cassette player with him to greasy spoons, public
parks, and more to listen to FM Radio and his own 50's and 60's hit
songs. We see Keitel tell an officer "You shouldn't be wasting your
time with this law enforcement nonsense!"

The sterotypical image of mobsters, justifiable or not, of people who
use hard language is amply demonstrated in this picture, which has
Keitel using dozens of phrases, words, straight from the gutter, or
even, simplistic, neanderthal ways of conveying human needs, desires.

This tough language is used between people, friends or foe, and will
shock people, from its graphic nature. The audience, will either
cringe, or mock it or both. Perhaps the ultimate cruelty, is Keitel
refusing to take out a debtor who is not cooperating, and being told
by his father " I should have strangled you in your crib!"

There is a complicated, challenging, difficult scene at the end,
involving ball squeezing, eyesocket punching, and similar, showing
below the belt tactics, further underlining the underground aspect of
this picture.

Overall, this picture is professional, extraordinarily lush, colorful
film with sharp images great for theatres, to scare the audience, in
a nightmare lasting 90 mins, when a man's morality is at stake, the
soul is up for grabs.

Director James Toback are to interracial relationships what Oliver Stone is to Vietnam. In this early effort, sponsored no less by Brut cologne, Harvey Keitel rehearses his lifelong cycle of variations as the bad lieutenant by playing this round, a bad Glenn Gould. The translucent Tisa Farrow (Mia's better half) personifies the complex seventies New York female artist, while Keitel, armed with Gouldish chattering teeth, begins his battle against on the cinematic motif of the piano, chosing this round, to attack Bach's Toccata BWV 914 (ironically, one of Glenn Gould's least favorite Bach piece).

The moment of high comedy arrives when Jimmy Fingers attempts to tame the beast within holding cell prisoners with an a capella rendition of the Allegro Fuga on the E Minor Toccata. One can't help but breath a sigh of relief that Toback didn't pick Schubert's Impromptu No.2 in E Flat Major. There's no telling what kind of sonic time space vortex Kietel would have unleashed in that instance.

Watch it nostalgically for the seventies swagger, the PlayLand-ladened Manhattan Streets and the cobblestones of Soho, and love it for the portable radio carrying pre-Walkman strut. Toback, is in top form juggling class, race, and taste between New York City characters that one would often see back in the day.

One almost expects scarfed-muzzled Gould to jump out at every intersection to give Jimmy Fingers a beating within an inch of his life with that big Canadian vocabulary.

"Fingers" is solid 1970s character study starring Harvey Keitel as conflicted man struggling to unite his disparate persona. On one hand, he's a talented musician who loves to listen to Bach and carries a boombox around so that he can listen to 60s R&B. However, he's also a violent thug who does his even more brutal father's bidding. The movie follows his character over a few days as he attempts to resolve who he is and what he stands for in life. It's a short, dark film that's very good to great in nearly every aspect.

The movie represents Harvey Keitel's first leading role, and he`s terrific, even riveting at times. Michael V. Gazzo ("The Godfather Part 2) is perhaps even better as Keitel's crude, Jerry Vale-loving father; he nearly screams every line he has, yet manages to avoid being a caricature. The supporting cast is filled with actors who would go on to greater fame, including Danny Aiello, Ed Marinaro, and Tony Sirico (Paulie on "The Sopranos"). Director/screenwriter James Toback was a virtual unknown at the time, having written only "The Gambler" (starring James Caan). Nevertheless, the script is nearly brilliant - full of small, vivid details and texture, although it's not always as cohesive as one might wish (resulting in the 4-star rating). His directing is confident, particularly given the amazingly zippy 19 day shooting time!

Lovers of 70s indie cinema will likely find many things to appreciate in "Fingers." A few other reviewers here compared the movie to "Mean Streets," and I agree that it's a fairly apt comparison, as both essentially focus on characters' attempts to reconcile their violence with their morality. However, this film is no mere Scorsese copycat and stands on its own just fine. Surprisingly, "Fingers" was remade in 2005 as a French film, called "The Beat That My Heart Skipped." I can't wait to check out that version.

Extras: Original theatrical trailer; a short conversation with Keitel and Toback about making indie films; director's audio commentary. Toback's commentary is excellent, and he discusses the thinly veiled homoeroticism of the main character - a definite must-listen.

Harvey Keitel rules---Toback makes sure that NYC circa 1978 is not mistaken by those who had the luxury to see what was all about NYC at that point in time...The most impotant actor during that period of NYC "movie-dom" (regardless of Woody and Martin) is Keitel. . .He's never been a product of "witness protection", while he's blown away as a pimp, or a free-base detective--Good night, rradiof