Review: 'Tetro'

There is a suitcase shoved onto a top shelf in an alcove, where Bennie discovers Tetro's last play, a mess of notes, a work tortured and unfinished. Like Pandora's box, family secrets begin tumbling out as he begins to decipher his brother's notes. I say decipher because the pages can only be read by holding them up to a mirror. Therein lies the rub. Coppola has made "Tetro" unnecessarily difficult. It's as if in writing the screenplay, his first original story in 30 years, he's bearing down so hard on the pencil that the point is forever breaking, the page is forever tearing.

In "Tetro," nearly every time Coppola should have clung to intimacy, he opts for excess. Especially tedious are the meta excerpts from staged productions -- overcompensation trying to masquerade as illumination. Regrettable since there is such fine work being done in the smaller moments, particularly by the wonderful Verdu of "Pan's Labyrinth" and "Y tu mama tambien," the always provocative Gallo, and Ehrenreich, someone I hope we see much more of.

Now 70, Coppola, like Tetro, is trying to escape the weight of a grand legacy, returning to a more organic form of filmmaking with stories closer to his heart. "Youth Without Youth" was the first, a disappointing muddle that was roundly rejected. With "Tetro," it feels as if the director is regaining his footing, figuring out which parts of his past to hold on to and which to let go.

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betsy.sharkey@latimes.com

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'Tetro'

MPAA rating: This film is not rated.

Running time: 2 hours, 7 minutes; English and subtitled Spanish

Playing: Landmark Westside Pavilion