LOVE RANCH (USA 2010) ***
Directed by Taylor Hackford

There are more enough interesting ideas in LOVE RANCH to make a couple of movies.  The LOVE RANCH is based on a true story – of the first legal brothel in the U.S.  The story is based on a bickering couple who each takes lovers on the side.  When one is diagnosed with cancer, things spiral out of control.

The married couple is Charlie (Joe Pesci) and his wife Grace (Helen Mirren).  Charlie is all talk and scheming.  His latest brainchild is to take on a boxer, Armando Bruza (Sergio Peris-Mencheta), who unfortunately starts an affair with Grace.  But Charlie is no saint either, banging regularly one of the employees at the ranch.  Their relationship is a volatile one.  Though they sleep in separate beds, they do care for each other.

Taylor Hackford (AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN, AGAINST ALL ODDS) keeps the events moving fast from the affairs, the championship fight to the quarrels and love scenes.  Hackford utilizes events to reveal the characters and how they interact.  For example, the film begins with a scene involving the brothel’s books.  The audience sees her Grace’s stability pitted against her husband’s wilder side.  The next has a cat fight broken up by Grace.  Here is revealed, Grace’s strength, tolerance and the respect she has maintained with the girls.  The film goes on much like this but there is lack of strong connection with the material.  Something appears to be missing that binds all the parts together and part of it has to do with the script’s omission of how Grace and Charlie met and got together with would serve as the basis of their relationship despite all the troubles faced on the ranch.  When the film ends, Grace and Charlie’s story doesn’t.  The end titles reveal that Grace spends a two year term in prison for tax evasion while Charlie escapes the country.  Further, a clip shows Grace opening a new love ranch and working it the dream ranch should have been.  In a way, the audience feels cheated in that most of the story has been omitted.  But who would want to see a film with Grace suffering two years in the slammer.

Still it is the performances that make LOVE RANCH entirely watchable.  Mirren is best, providing a regal performance as the queen of the ranch.  But the major surprise is newcomer Armando Bruza, the one who comes in between the two and comes out suffering the most.  His boxing bouts, love making and dramatic turns give the film a fresh look.

LOVE RANCH ends on a happy note with Grace eventually coming up tops.  But the question is whether her journey and fall from grace are worth it.  From Hackford’s film, all the incidents show that the opposite.