The late Philip Seymour Hoffman produced and stars in this sardonic tragicomedy adapted from a novel by Pete Dexter and directed by John Slattery. Hoffman plays the permanently crestfallen Mickey, a meat vendor and small-time crook in God's Pocket, a seedy working-class slum in some unspecified Eastern seaboard area circa 1980. Married to neighborhood siren Jeanie (Christina Hendricks), Mickey has never quite gained acceptance from the loutish locals. When his druggie psycho stepson, Leon (Caleb Landry Jones), is "accidentally" killed at his construction job (actually bludgeoned to death by a fed-up co-worker), Mickey strives to give Leon a proper funeral, although he can't afford it and his every attempt to make things right goes badly awry. Meanwhile, an alcoholic newspaper columnist (Richard Jenkins) starts probing into Leon's suspicious demise and also becomes smitten with Jeanie. An excellent cast of born scene-stealers (John Turturro, Joyce Van Patten, etc.) spice up the vignette-heavy plot featuring a series of Really Bad Ideas and poor life choices that unfold like a slow-motion accident scene from which one can't look away. Recommended. (C. Cassady)
God's Pocket
MPI, 89 min., R, DVD: $24.98, Blu-ray: $29.98 Volume 30, Issue 1
God's Pocket
Star Ratings
As of March 2022, Video Librarian has changed from a four-star rating system to a five-star one. This change allows our reviewers to have a wider range of critical viewpoints, as well as to synchronize with Google’s rating structure. This change affects all reviews from March 2022 onwards. All reviews from before this period will still retain their original rating. Future film submissions will be considered our new 1-5 star criteria.
Order From Your Favorite Distributor Today: