FADING GIGOLO doesn’t just star Woody Allen – from the very beginning, we are submerged in what feels reassuringly like a bona fide Woody Allen film: the gentle jazz soundtrack, the grainy shots of a Jewish neighbourhood in Brooklyn, the witty interplay between the central characters. Yet despite its obvious influences, FADING GIGOLO fails to quite match Allen’s best work.
John Turturro directs and stars as Fioravante, the ‘fading gigolo’ of the film’s title:jaded, middle-aged but blessed with a persistent and opportunistic pal in Murray (Woody Allen, in full Woody Allen mode). Overhearing a female friend discussing the prospect of a ménage à trois with his dermatologist, Murray formulates a business plan. His friend will act out the fantasies of bored housewives, leaving his agent or ‘pimp’, Murray, with a sizeable cut for services rendered. Under the watchful eye of the local police, they descend further into the murky world of male prostitution, and in a series of smart set-ups, things often take a farcical turn for both Fioravante and Murray. The awkward dialogue may not be up to his own high standards at times but Allen drives the action forward with his trademark nervous energy.
‘So this is what you do…bring magic to the lonely’
When lonely Jewish widow Avigal (an ethereal Vanessa Paradis) comes to hear of Fioravante’s liberating effect on women, and is introduced to the fading gigolo, the film really begins to venture beneath the skin of its characters and explore new depths. Whereas the other two main female customers – Sharon Stone and Sofia Vergara – are playful if predictable cougars on the hunt for the fabled ménage, the emotional power of the film is supplied by the gentle murmur of romance between this grieving widow, a woman who struggles to allow herself to be touched at all, and Fioravante, a man who never seems able to engage with a woman on any level beyond the physical. In a film which displays the full reach of the male gaze, one of the most moving and sensual scenes involves nothing but a tentative massage.
‘So this is what you do…bring magic to the lonely’, Avigal tells Fioravante towards the end of the film. The viewer is left with the real sense that, after his initial reticence and bemusement, it is his own loneliness which drives Turturro’s character on in a search for genuine affection. Along with the frothiness and the cute nods and winks to social mores, Turturro the director delivers an engaging couple of hours, with a good pace to the narrative and some entertaining, if somewhat two-dimensional, character turns. While the initial set-up feels a little contrived, there are some funny moments and, fortunately, Woody Allen is on hand to deliver them.
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