Season of schmaltz

>> Stolen Summer tries too hard to be sweet

by MATTHEW HAYS

I can’t recall if it’s in the Old or New Testament, but I’m sure there’s something in there about schmaltz begetting schmaltz.

And that almighty dictum hasn’t been broken here. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, the wunderkind duo who netted an Oscar for their first feature screenplay, Good Will Hunting, decided to pass on some of their glory, and set up Project Greenlight, an online screenplay competition. Pete Jones was their lucky winner with this, Stolen Summer, now completed and hitting cinemas this week.
Odd as it may seem for someone to differ with the Academy, I thought Hunting was wildly overrated and infinitely too schmaltzy. I don’t think it warranted any Oscars, not for screenwriting nor for Robin Williams’ nonperformance. Stolen Summer is a chip off that block.

Phew, is this thing oozing with syrup and sap. There’s nothing like flagrantly exploiting terminally ill children as a way of ripping out an audience’s collective heart. Here, a wee lad (well played by (Adi Stein) decides he must try being a better Catholic by saving some Jews and having them convert. He’s not being terribly sensitive, but because he’s eight his naivete is supposed to be really funny. He befriends a local Rabbi (Kevin Pollack), explaining that he just wants to save someone Jewish so that they can go to heaven. Luck of the Irish, the Rabbi has a terminally ill son who Stein can befriend and try to save!

Jones has some good intentions here, and some of the film feels as though it’s autobiographical. Best of all is the tension that runs throughout the Catholic household, as Aidan Quinn plays a blue-collar patriarch who can’t accept his eldest son’s aspirations to become a doctor.

But there are far, far too many cutesy jokes about religion (kids can be so wacky when they don’t know what they’re talking about!) and then there’s that unbearable musical score, which is constantly nagging us about feeling sorrier for everyone onscreen.

I hope Jones gets a shot at a second feature, but he’d better take a crash course in subtlety. Lord knows, he’s not going to learn anything on that front from Damon or Affleck. :

Stolen Summer opens Friday, May 3