Friday, January 7, 1994
Entertainment
Kosher pig tale limp
MARC HORTON Journal Movie Writer
REVIEW
LEON THE PIG FARMER
Directors: Gary Sinyor, Vadim Jean
Starring: Mark Frankel, Janet Suzman, Brian Glover
Showing at: The Princess Theatre, tonight through Tuesday
Classification: Parental guidance
The British film Leon the Pig Farmer, a movie about love and the development of a kosher pig, should be funnier than it is.
As a concept it sounds daft enough to bring a few laughs, but the pacing is so lead-footed that the movie bogs down in the slop.
Leon Geller, played by Mark Frankel, is a Jewish real estate agent who suffers from compulsive honesty.
He simply must tell clients the complete truth about prospective properties before he closes the sale. And when the firm for which he works decides to buy the house once owned by Charles Dickens and turn it into a leisure centre – complete with an aromatherapy suite – it’s too much.
He quits his job to work as a delivery boy for the kosher catering firm owned by his mother, played by Janet Suzman.
When he delivers lunch to a medical office building, he makes a shocking discovery.
(The building’s elevator operator is a daffy delight: “Second floor: marriage counseling, sex therapy,” he announces.)
It seems that his father had a low sperm count and that Leon is the result of artificial insemination.
His biological father, an eccentric named Brian Chadwick, is a ruddy Yorkshire pig farmer, a shocking thing for a Jewish boy as orthodox as Leon.
The film’s highlight occurs when Leon visits the Chadwick pig farm to get to know his father.
The Chadwicks are a welcoming lot, willing to do anything for their new-found relative. That includes embracing the tenets of the Jewish faith, or as many as they can cram in their lives on short notice.
The movie sags, however, when Leon tries to find romance, either in the arms of Madeleine, a stained-glass artist played by Maryam d’Abo, or Lisa, his adventure-seeking neighbor played by Gina Bellman.
The infatuations are only entanglements in the plot, and not particularly necessary ones either.
Leon the Pig Farmer is a small film. And the laughs are little, too.
