I'M NOT RAPPAPORT

Starring Walter Matthau and Ossie Davis Directed by Herb Gardner Rated PG-13, with profanity, brief violence and light drug use Running time 136 With 10 as a must-see, Jack gives this film a 7

(Jan 31, 1997) -- If writer-director Herb Gardner didn't have much imagination, his film might have been called I'm Not Dead. After all, it's about two elderly men (Walter Matthau and Ossie Davis) who spend the movie demonstrating their capacity for life.

But Gardner grabbed a more appealing and offbeat title from an old vaudeville routine. The movie is called I'm Not Rappaport.

For the film, veteran Gardner adapts his own, much-respected 1986 Broadway play about two old guys who while away the hours each day on a bench in Central Park.

Matthau plays 81-year-old Nat Moyer, a Jewish radical of the old school, and an obsessive talker and storyteller. There's only one problem: Nearly all his stories are lies.

"Not lies," he argues. "Alterations. I make certain alterations. Sometimes the truth don't fit. I take in here. I let out there. Till it fits."

As part of his relentless storytelling, Nat also assumes a wide variety of fake identities. In the course of the film, he tries to convince people he's a lawyer, a food inspector, a union representative and a mafia don.

"I was one person for over 80 years; why not a hundred for the next five?"

And most of the "people" Nat becomes are trying to pick a fight. Nat looks back fondly on his youth, among immigrant Jews in New York's radical union environment. He still sees every issue as an excuse to continue "the struggle of the proletariat."

On the opposite end of the park bench sits Midge (Davis), also 81, a nearly blind night superintendent of a Park Avenue apartment building. Unlike Nat, Midge keeps his feet on the ground and his mind in the present reality. He's a realist, and will do just about anything to avoid conflict.

As you can imagine, Midge views Nat as a dangerous troublemaker.

"This here's MY spot," Midge tells Nat. "It's been my spot six months now, and a good and peaceful spot till you show up a week ago and start playin' three-card monte with my head."

Each man spends much of his considerable amount of idle time trying to avoid the nemesis in his life.

For Midge, it's the young president of his building's tenants association. Midge knows they want him to retire.

For Nat, it's his well-meaning but meddlesome daughter (Amy Irving), who wants to corral her father into either her home or a rest home.

Though both men obviously love their hours in Central Park, they also fall victim to its dangers. First, they try to fight off the extortion threats of a knife-wielding delinquent. Then they get in WAY over their heads when they try to help a young woman (Martha Plimpton) escape her violent drug dealer (Craig T. Nelson).

Unfortunately, that latter tale takes I'm Not Rappaport heavily into melodrama when a more restrained grace note would have made a more meaningful final act. It's a brief sidetrack that seems as unneccesary as it is uncomfortable. Filmgoers don't need the ominous threats of a violent sociopath to understand the issues of care and security for the elderly.

But that miscue aside, I'm Not Rappaport is a funny, touching exploration of old age -- set in a Central Park that's never been so richly evoked before on screen. Though a bit too long, the film offers an amusing, thoughtful glimpse of the problems and issues awaiting many of us.

"The problem is NOT that life is short but that it's very long; so you better have a policy," Nat says. "Here we are. Look at us. We're the coming attractions."

Matthau and Davis have nearly a century of experience between them -- and are natural treasures. Their deeply etched portrayals of Nat and Midge reflect the actors' experience and craftsmanship. They know what they're talking about when they espouse the value of longevity.

"Don't you understand," Nat says. "The old people, they're the SURVIVORS. They KNOW something. They haven't just stayed late to ruin your party."