As its precious title suggests, Used People is one of those movies that calculatedly wears its old-fashionedness on its sleeve. Aspiring to be a Jewish Moonstruck or maybe a Fried Green Latkes, this ethnic dramady set in 1969 Queens is unquestionably charmed by itself. Unfortunately, its opinion of itself is in the minority. Used People trades on heartwarming eccentricity and life-affirming schmaltz as if they were the best thing since sliced bread. (This movie is totally devoid of irony.) Driven by character rather than plot, the film fitfully lays out the psychic wounds of a family recently bereaved by the loss of its patriarch, only to resolve everyone’s problems in the last 15 minutes. These resolutions, no matter how improbable or forced, constitute the punch line of Used People: life is difficult, but stick it out and there’ll be a happy ending. If screenwriter Todd Graff had concentrated more on the narrative, this film might have come together — there’s a rich comic vein to be mined in the idea of a stranger asking out the widow at her dead husband’s funeral, especially when he’s a dapper, life-loving Italian and she’s a proper Jewish lady. But with the screenplay moving in fits and jerks, the movie does the same, leaving its estimable cast stranded. As the widow struggling with her desire to take chances, MacLaine has one all-stops-out scene in which she talks about the sacrifices she’s made for her family with the repressed rage of a volcano about to spew. It’s an illuminating scene that provides some insight into her character; otherwise, MacLaine comes off looking like she’s just sucked on a lemon for most of the film. Bates and Harden are given thankless roles of thankless daughters — one’s bitter about always being the fat girl who smelled funny, the other dresses up like Jackie Kennedy, Anne Bancroft (Mrs. Robinson), and other Sixties icons as a way of coping with the tragic death of her son. Tandy does her Miss Daisy thing again, while Mastroianni plays the Italian suitor with an unaffected Old World charm, if not with a complete mastery of the English language. If Graff had only created some real people, as opposed to used ones, for these actors to play, Used People might seem a little more fresh.
This article appears in January 22 • 1993 (Cover).
