Word: peretz
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Directed by Jesse Peretz...
This is the bayou of Jesse Peretz '90, director of the new movie First Love, Last Rites. Peretz is probably best known as the former bass guitarist of the band The Lemonheads, and since having left the group, he has achieved a considerable amount of success, directing a number of music videos and commercial spots for MTV as well as a few short films. True, First Love, Last Rites is his first full-length feature, but the movie is by no means a rookie effort. Indeed, the film serves as a vehicle through which Peretz displays the most interesting ability...
...most alluring features of the movie is the complete character reversal Joey and Sissel appear to undergo as the story progresses, a reversal which is very well effected both by director Peretz and writer David Ryan (who, along with Peretz, adapted the screenplay from a short story written by Ian McEwan). As the movie opens, Joey comes across as naive and impressionable, perhaps even numb to outside sensation. His lack of worldly perspective is as present in his eagerness to embark on a business venture about which he knows nothing as it is in his coy admission to Sissel that...
...polite and playful at the same time it is slyly calculated. And possibly even better is her withdrawal, acted with a cool removal and detachment from her surroundings that translates both mentally and emotionally. Giovanni Ribisi is good as the young Joey, but probably more so because of Peretz's and Ryan's adaptation of the story than anything else. Great though the character may be presented, Ribisi plays him as more ignorant than innocent, a subtle distinction that in the end postpones the viewers' ability to understand his plight until later on in the movie...
...When Peretz bought the magazine in 1974, he had the goal of "refocussing" American liberalism...