The Bad Boys Next Door

A year or so ago, filmmaker Adam Rifkin met Donnie Montemarano and Vinny Argiro, lifelong pals from Brooklyn, and was so taken with their colorful personalities and stories he soon realized he had at last discovered the leads for his next film, “Night at the Golden Eagle”--never mind that the two men had no acting experience.

Rifkin’s gamble paid off, for the two prove to be naturals, without a trace of self-consciousness. The result is a stylized melodrama, oozing in picturesque skid row seediness and given an aura of poignant authenticity by the sturdy, vital presence of Montemarano and Argiro.

The film opens with Argiro’s Mic meeting Montemarano’s Tommy at a prison, where he is being released by his warden (James Caan, in a cameo). (Montemarano actually served 11 years for a racketeering conviction.) Upset that Mic no longer has his car, Tommy suggests stealing another instead of taking the bus. He’s only half-joking because we quickly discover that Tommy is a small-time crook who is forever going too far and often bringing down Mic with him.

Mic is nevertheless thrilled to be with his old pal again and outlines his dreams for their future. Mic’s been living in a dingy old L.A. skid row hotel, the Golden Eagle, and clerking at a nearby porn store. But he’s managed to save up $2,500 for them to start new lives in Las Vegas as blackjack dealers and has already purchased a pair of bus tickets so they can take off the next morning. It hardly leaves Tommy time to louse up what Mic realistically sees as the last chance either of them will have for a decent, stable existence.

In the meantime, Rifkin pulls back to place Tommy and Mic in the context of the people and events in the same night at the Golden Eagle. A subplot soon emerges with seasoned streetwalker Sally (Ann Magnuson) being told by her tough pimp Rodan (Vinnie Jones) to show the ropes to teenage Lori Ann (Nicole Jacobs), a runaway with dreams of becoming an actress. Lori Anne brings out the protective, maternal instincts in Sally. Rifkin counterpoints the complexities of Tommy and Mic’s friendship with the one developing between Sally and Lori Ann, with Mic and Sally emerging at the wiser but more vulnerable in the parallel relationships.

Living in the room below Mic is Cornelius Maynard, the surviving half of a famed team of dancing brothers, and he is beautifully played by the great Fayard Nicholas, the surviving half of the legendary Nicholas brothers. Sam Moore (part of the legendary R&B; group Sam and Dave) is Sylvester, his TV-watching pal with delusions--or so they seem--of grandeur past. Miles Dougal is a sullen, bored young clerk; nearby outside is a homeless bag lady, played by none other than Russ Meyer favorite Kitten Natividad, who is unrecognizable until she has a drug-induced dream in which she imagines herself in a ball gown dancing with a man in white tie and tails.

Rifkin’s script has considerable theatricality, with some touches of dark humor and sentimentality, and Rifkin goes with that tone with appropriate panache. His skid row is romanticized, with the residents living in artful, bohemian decay instead of outright stark squalor, and it’s been a long time since skid row-vicinity hookers looked as good as Sally and Lori Anne. Since Rifkin struck gold with Montemarano and Argiro, it’s too bad he didn’t stick longer with them and back off on his more familiar take on streetwalkers’ sordid, brutal existence. That said, the always-distinctive Magnuson illuminates the extreme degree of willed self-denial Sally must exert if she is to survive.

All of Rifkin’s key people are dreamers living marginal, impoverished existences, except for Cornelius Maynard, who like Fayard Nicholas himself, has known real fame and acclaim and is warmed by golden memories. Suffused with an apt sepia glow by Rifkin’s highly creative cameraman Checco Varese, “Night at the Golden Eagle” is a modest pleasure that accomplishes its goals with ease and confidence.

*

MPAA rating: R, for gritty violence, sexuality, language and some drug use. Times guidelines: strong brutality and language, adult themes.

‘Night at the Golden Eagle’

Vinny Argiro...Mic

Donnie Montemarano...Tommy

Ann Magnuson...Sally

Vinnie Jones...Rodan

A Shangri-La Entertainment release. Writer-director Adam Rifkin. Producers Rifkin, Steve Bing. Executive producers Morgan Sackett, Mindy Marin. Cinematographer Checco Varese. Editor Peter Schlink. Music Tyler Bates. Costumes Mynka Draper. Production designer Sherman Williams. Set decorator Sally Nicolaou. Running time: 1 hour, 27 minutes.

Exclusively at the Nuart through Thursday, 11272 Santa Monica Blvd., West Los Angeles, (310) 478-6379.