Movie Review - Don Jon

Don Jon **** (R) I’m not sure where the term "Guido" stands now on the Political Correctness scale. It was clearly pejorative until TV series like The Sopranos and Jersey Shore seemingly converted it into a cultural badge of honor. Since it so perfectly describes the cast and milieu of this deceptively smart and funny romantic dramedy, please allow me to use "G-word", with all due respect, within this review. I’m just sayin’...

Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars as a classic "G-word" who picks up the hottest chicks at local clubs for one-nighters with enviable ease. But that success means less to him than the less gifted would imagine. He’s even more obsessed with porn, preferring to take matters into his own hand, as it were. Real women are more complicated, and for him, less satisfying than the idealized versions available on computer or TV screens. Then he meets one (Scarlett Johansson) who just might be compelling enough to supplant his actual and virtual harems. Johansson ranges far afield of any previous role we’ve seen, sporting the looks, sound and attitude of a brassy Jersey gal, whose hair and jewelry are almost as big and gaudy as the chip on her shoulder. She arrives with her own culturally-ingrained, unrealistic view of romance, butting heads with his. Julianne Moore, Tony Danza (Papa "G-word" in every detail) and Glenne Headly lend fine support.

For a plot so heavily grounded in sex, the film is surprisingly short on titillation, and not the least bit ironic or condescending about its characters or their lives. Gordon-Levitt, who also wrote and directed, makes us care about a guy who would be easy to dislike, while keeping him true to his environs. He’s a classic Jersey dude who masturbates compulsively and discards women as fast and causally as he beds them. But he’s still sympathetic. After 25 years in front of movie and TV cameras, Gordon-Levitt’s feature film debut wearing these other two hats is quite impressive. (9/27/13)