Romance and Cigarettes

The bleakly bizarre, uneven aesthetic and direction that is fluid but not quite limber succeed and fail from montage to montage, with the principals doing a sort of karaoke tribute to the likes of Joplin and Springsteen...

Chockfull of ideas and with an irreverence that irresistibly recalls late '60s American cinema, thesp John Turturro's third outing in the helmer's chair, Romance & Cigarettes, alternately shines and sputters...

There is more raw vitality pumping through Romance & Cigarettes, John Turturro’s passionate ode to the sensual pulse of life in a working-class neighborhood of Queens, than in a dozen perky high school musicals. This is a movie in which a dirty mind is a good thing. Call it “The Singing Id.” Prudes, be forewarned...

The sad result is a karaoke nightmare. Loud and pointlessly crude, the film takes the disintegration of a dysfunctional working-class family and gives it the song-and-dance treatment...

A tenuous plot disperses into a smoky haze in low-budget tune-fest Romance & Cigarettes. It's billed as a "down and dirty musical about love" and actor-turned-filmmaker John Turturro certainly brings a cheekily raw and edgy quality to a stagnating format. There are also hearty performances from James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon and Kate Winslet as three corners of a suburban love triangle, but that's just one facet in a film of many parts that fail to harmonise...