Fraught family ties

A lad breaks away from his mobster family
life in The Mysteries of Pittsburgh

COMPLICATED COMING OF AGE:
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh

by MATTHEW HAYS

Witness the complexities of adapting a book to the big screen. Some have argued that crappy books usually make for great movies (Jaws), while great books often flunk when mashed into celluloid (The Bonfire of the Vanities). There was great anticipation when Rawson Marshall Thurber (Dodgeball) announced his intention to bring Michael Chabon’s celebrated 1988 novel The Mysteries of Pittsburgh to cinematic life.

The story features gay-straight tension for the central character, as well as a mobster father he’s dying to break away from, and the results here are mixed. Thurber has certainly done well in assembling his cast. Jon Foster plays a young, clean-cut man who is eager to continue pursuing a college education. He has monthly, strained dinners with his hard-edged mobster dad (Nick Nolte), while taking on work at a chain bookstore for minimum wage. It’s a strange coming-of-age story, and at many times Mysteries strains our suspension of disbelief.

There are the lighter moments—Foster starts shagging the bookstore’s dimwitted manager (Mena Suvari), matched by darker ones (Nolte’s ominous intermittent presence). In fact, it’s really quite hard to believe that someone like Nolte has spawned someone like Foster. But if you are willing to suspend your disbelief, there’s a lot to merit Mysteries.

The real fun begins when Foster meets the hot Sienna Miller at a party. He’s smitten, naturally, but then learns that she has a boyfriend, the sexually ambiguous, hotheaded Peter Sarsgaard. Foster ends up hanging out with the couple, and develops a mighty crush on both of them.

Some of Mysteries is quite erotic, some of it quite surprising. (It is laudable that Thurber didn’t shy away from the Foster-Sarsgaard tryst, for example). But there’s still a strange disconnect between Foster and his father—Nolte and Foster are supposed to be estranged, yes, but they seem to be in entirely different movies.

Nice performances all around—though I’ve got to say, Sarsgaard has emerged as the finest screen actor of his generation. He delivers another perfect turn here. He is gutsy, instinctual and nuanced as an actor. He brings up every movie he’s in by several notches.

THE MYSTERIES OF PITTSBURGH
OPENS FRIDAY, APRIL 10