Newsday from New York, New York • 75

iuuuwnnfir B7 IMOVIEIREVIEW An Evocative Latino Family Melodrama that almost drowned him A rift develops between Josd (Eduardo Lopez Rojas) and Chucho that serves as a grim prelude to the tragedy that follows The legacy of that tragedy is borne most acutely by younger son Jimmy (Jimmy Smite) who by the early 1980s is even more of an accident waiting to happen than Chucho was Older sister Toni (Constance Marie) an ex-nun-tumed -activist extracts reluctant willingness to many a Salvadoran woman (Elpida Carrillo) in danger of depor- tation Eventually they fall in love and she gets pregnant But as is often the case in this tale ever is out of reach Nava who wrote the screenplay with his wife producer Anna Thomas seasons this generational epic with quasi-mystical imagery voluptuous colors and a delicate feel for period detaiL Even when the story goes over the top its rich design and fine performances keep you engrossed Many of the lesser-known actors like Rojas and Carrillo are revelations You wish there were more of the redoubtable Olmos but what little there is is surprisingly frisky You also wish Morales could find roles that require as much smoldering very good at it but when you watch his Chucho leading little kids in an impromptu mambo lesson you sense a graceful comedian inside Morales yearning to bust through the Angry Young Man Of performance it's enough to say that the producers of having weathered the loss of David Caruso may need to worry again about sacrificing their leading man to the movies OK so his face becomes a teaiy sponge once too often The rest of the time as enigmatic and compelling as Bobby Simone and just a little scarier MY FAMILY (Ml FAMHJA) (R) Jimmy Smits Esai Morales and Edward James Olmos lead the first-rate cast at this engaging bittersweet epic tracking three generations of a Latino famiy in East Los Angeles Directed and co-scripted by Gregory Nava 2:00 (Mence sexuaity rough language) At area theaters By Gene Seymour staff warm iTT I HERE'S SO MUCH about Family (Mi Familia) movie-of-the-week-sappy you wonder as watching it why enjoying it so much No mystery really Even if it were only halfway decent the film would swallow up our wandering attention spans because nearly all of us are suckers for heavily layered fomihr melodrama whether close to our own families or not is more than just halfway decent It is evocative well-crafted and performed with verve and passion by a first-rate cast of Latino actors They along with director Gregory Nava bring the kind of depth to the Mexican-American experience that commercial movies rarely if ever convey It all starts with the very long walk young Joed Sanchez takes from his Central Mexican village to East Los Angeles This was in the 1920s when as Paco (Edward James Olmos) the family griot says only border between Mexico and the United States was a line in the Joed finds steady work manicuring Beverly Hills lawns On one such lawn he finds Maria a pretty young housekeeper whom he marries As the Great Depression takes hold Josd and Maria struggle to keep food on the table for their two young children While pregnant with her third As Jimmy Sanchez Jimmy Smits is enigmatic and compelling Maria though a citizen is caught up in an immigration sweep loaded into a railroad car and sent back to the Mexican higtihmlr Cut off from the rest of her family Maria takes her newborn son Chucho with her back to the States despite their near-fatal encounter with a torrential rivei along the way The film moves to the late 1950s where Chucho (Esai Morales from grown into a charismatic and volatle young man become part of a street culture as full of peril as the rivei PART 2 NY new york newsoay Wednesday may a 199s IDANCE1REVIEW All-Star Summer Concert Lineup By Ira Robbins STAFF WRITER Bright Premieres By Twyla Tharp AMERICAN SALLEY THEATER Three premieres by Twyla Ttap Monday night at the Metropolitan Open House Lincoln Center Manhattan Wed repertory through June 17 JHE SUMMER concert I I crystal ball is clearing I I with the announce- I 1 ment of the Lollapa- LJ looza lineup the free SummerStage shows in Central Park and the complete Jones Beach schedule Tickets go on sale early Saturday for a worth of all-star Jones Beach shows covering the waterfront of musical styles from the to the 90s The lineup stretches from pioneering great Ruth Brown (on a June 4 bill head A gala spirit returns as Jafie becomes a soubrette in Moto Perpetuo frisking into the wings and then returning for yet another round of tiny pointe steps to Frederick and John cornet music with Renvall and the rest of the dancers charging in for the uplifting finale The music was arranged fay Donald Hunsberger costumes were fay Santo Loquasto and lighting (for all three pieces) was by Jennifer Tipton Near which premiered in Washington last March addresses not the end of life so much as the meaning of life and whatever comes after it Set to Benjamin cm a Theme of Frank mid inspired in part fay an Emily Dickinson poem it will become one of classics JafTe and Kathleen Moore the two principal ballerinas wear elegant Gianni Versace gowns You could not wish for better dancing than theirs classicism and fire are both so clearly part of esthetic which constantly cross-comments on ballet and modern dance In Near Heaven" Jafie and Moore have different choreographic adventures excitingly partnered by Gil Boggs and Guillaume Graflin But at the end we see that they are complementary halves of one whole Cynthia Harvey and Charles Askegard the close-partnered principal couple are in blue possibly as an idealization of love The work is magnificently Tharpy using her signature ripples short stops superextended extremities and wonderful wit Through them the two principal women look back on their lives: chat and flirtation smoking and social dancing eons of good times and long friendships And when in their celestial space they bow together we suddenly know witnessed not just the lives of an Everywoman but the lives of an artist The best art in an ensemble piece came from composer Wynton Marsalis and his orchestra The dancers costumed In bright Mizrahi personified vivacity and athleticism but the themes felt a little tired There were too many torchy hang-on-the-man moves too many knowing stares flippy ponytails and pelvic saunters Tharp has moved beyond such calculated festiveness and brought us right along with her By Janice Berman WRITES DT WAS Twyla night which means it was American Ballet night to be showered with the riches of the imagination gala performance of her three new ballets brilliantly reflected 30-year association with ABT The work was bright dark optimistic passionate Tharp did not perform unless you count the marvelous curtain call when sexy in black she staggered happily under the weight of floral tributes But she remains a quintessential entertainer obsessed with engaging the hearts and minds while reaching right in there for the gut and the funny bone Take set to favorite 19th-Century tunes composed fay Stephen Foster Henry Fillmore and Niccolo Paganini It begins afloat in romanticism Then Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms" a folksong from the British Isles gives way to Fillmore circus music with Johan Ren vall's spectacular spins and leaps stealing the show vision scene comes next set to Foster's With the Light Brown (sung beautifully by David Ripley) with Sunn Jafie in tulle and on pointe as the idealized woman of Michael memories It moves seamlessly from a reverie on lost love to a memorial for lost life as the young men fall in battle a reminder of how swiftly circus ground can become killing field lined fay Bonnie Raitt) to current chart-topping alternative rockers Live from the exquisite vocals of Anita Baker to the jolly nostalgia of the Beach Bqys from Phish to the Cranberries And the notoriously stage-shy Carly Simon Tickets go on sale at 8 am Saturday at the Jones Beach box office in Wantagh LI Ticketmaster outlets and via Please see SOUNDS on hge B9.