Shared Darkness

Christopher Walken is a multiple Oscar nominee, but his talent has been overshadowed to significant degree by both his highly imitable vocal delivery patten and penchant for eccentricity as well as, simply put, his love to work, which has led to him appearing in many dozens of films, including a lot of dreck. $5 a Day, a father-son reconciliation road movie with he and Alessandro Nivola, isn’t terrible, or worthy of inclusion in that risible, latter category of Walken’s canon, but it is a film that is illustrative of the difference between narrative charm and conflict.



Nat Parker (Walken) is an eccentric, by-the-seat-of-his-pants type of guy — a hustler content with a life of schemes and underhanded deals. He has a sponsored car with Sweet ‘N Low plastered all over it, a seemingly endless supply of phone cards with which he likes to barter, and a penchant for hitting up hotels and casinos for their free coffee, but he lacks one thing: reconciliation with his son Flynn (Nivola). Flynn has long ago ceased trusting his father — after a one-year stint in prison on a larceny charge — which has in turn greatly impacted his relationship with his girlfriend Maggie (Amanda Peet). But Nat’s time is apparently growing short. After being diagnosed with a terminal illness, Nat lures Flynn into joining him on a cross-country journey to an experimental medical facility, with special stop-offs to visit a kooky ex-babysitter, Dolores (Sharon Stone), and the blackmail of an old rival (Peter Coyote) to boot.

Nat is an eccentric character on the written page (he plans his journey west based around IHOPs he and Flynn can hit up for free “birthday” breakfasts), so Walken’s casting in some ways might seem kind of yawningly uninspired — a bit too on-the-nose. Thankfully, though, Walken doesn’t over-crank the quirkiness, instead locating in Nat a smidgen of make-it-right regret. Nivola, meanwhile, nicely modulates his exasperation, and his pairing with Walken makes for an engaging push-and-pull, scene to scene.

Directed by Nigel Cole (Saving Grace, Calendar Girls, A Lot Like Love) from a script by Neal and Tippi Dobrofsky, $5 a Day isn’t particularly egregious in any of its missteps, though it does wildly over-calculate the interest of its stopover with Stone’s Dolores, a vampy cougar on whom Flynn is supposed to nurse a curse. The chief problem is that while the movie charms, it never particularly feels propelled forward by any real conflict. Things just… happen, some of which are kind of funny, some of which a bit less so. Instead, a handful of genealogical twists and other mortal-coil issues are crammed into the final 10 to 15 minutes of the film, though not in a manner that comes across as satisfying or particularly believable. For fans of the actors and hardcore enthusiasts of the “road movie” genre — of which there are enough entrants to program its own festival — $5 a Day has enough charm to warrant a rental; others, however, may mostly shrug.

Housed in a regular plastic Amaray case in turn stored in a cardboard slipcover, $5 a Day comes to DVD presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen, with a Dolby digital 5.1 audio mix, and optional, lax English and Spanish subtitles, each of which feature some errors. Bonus features consist of a choppy slate of a half dozen interviews with the cast and director Cole — a roster hamstrung by the fact that, inexplicably, Walken isn’t included. Of the bits that are included, it’s somewhat amusing to hear Stone talk about her reasons for taking the movie (“A comedy with Christopher Walken — I’m there!”), as well as first encountering Nivola while taking meetings for Basic Instinct 2. There is also a trailer for the movie, and a gallery of photo stills by Michael Parmalee. To purchase the movie via Amazon, click here; to get the Blu-ray, meanwhile, click here. The movie is also available via digital download. B- (Movie) C (Disc)