Geezers (2000 Video) User Reviews

Terrific Film: Bittersweet and Nostalgic

[PaulSantos7676 · 9/10 · 8 February 2010]

From Writer-Director Peter Bohush, a wonderfully-touching journey back to the 1930s, during the depths of the Great Depression. With antique cars, period costumes and a flair for detail, "Geezers" transforms a small New England town back seven decades with unerring accuracy. In particular, look for a very young David Morwick ("Little Erin Merryweather", "The Mondavi Gang") as the adolescent Willie McKee. Also take note of a great shot right at the start: Morwick, opposite the camera, roaring through town on an antique car while shouting at his girlfriend. Like the car he's riding, it's classic.

Bohush is especially good switching from present-day scenes (including splendid comedy from Sam D'Entremont and Howard Nickerson) to flashbacks featuring Morwick and his girl, Jennifer Lynn Jones. The dreamy, nostalgic sequences, clearly Bohush's strong suit, show that first loves die hard, very hard -- and with them, sometimes, our innocence.

Funny and touching. I loved it!

[carl5 · 10/10 · 9 February 2010]

Geezers was really well done: acting, story, camera, etc. At first it seemed like it might cover similar ground as Grumpy Old Men, but instead it takes the audience on a unique journey. At its core, this is a story about how love never dies, or rather how a broken heart never heals. We think about love in the movies as something for young people. And through the flashbacks we see the young lovers as they fall in love and then break apart. For some movies that's the whole plot. But writer-director Peter Bohush picks up the story 60 years later, with the young man now an old man who still holds the deep passion for his lost true love. The actors are perfectly cast: the two old guys really seem to have had a lifelong relationship. And the two young actors portray the innocence of the 1930s period without going overboard into sentimentality. The reveal at the end was really well done film-making. A line spoken, the actor turns, the camera reveals and in an instant everything is clear. I admit I teared up a bit there. But thinking about it later, how else could this story end? Perfect. I laughed out loud at the toll booth scene. And I also really liked the cinematic device of putting the old man in the flashback scenes to transition in and out.