neumu [ cinematronic ]




	Passionada
	Dan Ireland Jason Isaacs, Sofia Milos, Emmy Rossum, Theresa Russell, Seymour Cassel, Lupe Ontiveros 2002		In essence, "Passionada" is an old-fashioned romance with typical characters and situations, a couple of dangling plot threads, a few groaners in the dialogue department and a predictable resolution. This verging-on-sappy story of a beautiful Portuguese-American widow who gets involved with a world-weary gambler on the skids isn't painfully awful. It's just a chick flick that doesn't amount to much more than mild emotional gratification for the ingenuous. "Passionada" has a picturesque setting, the seaside town of New Bedford, Mass., where a substantial Portuguese community works in the fishing industry. The cast is uniformly good, rising above the script's shortcomings. Sofia Milos is Celia, a single mother who clings to the memory of her late husband and fills her time with a day job as a seamstress and a nighttime gig as a lounge singer. Jason Isaacs is card-counting casino-crawler Charlie Beck, who is smitten with Celia. Seymour Cassel and Theresa Russell are Charlie's friends, retired scam artists. Emmy Rossum is Celia's daughter, a lovely, feisty teen blossoming into womanhood. Note: The film's sonorous soundtrack is heavy with "fado," an emotional style of ballad from Portugal.