The Last Schmaltz

DANNY COLLINS (B+) - An engaging cast rescues this heartfelt comic drama before it pegs into the Hallmark zone. It's clever and touching in turns.

What you see is what you get: Al Pacino plays an aging superstar (a little bit Neil Diamond, Billy Joel and Leonard Cohen) who just runs through the hits onstage for the old ladies in his audience and hasn't written a song in 30 years. Turns out Danny told an interviewer in 1971 that he feared that success might change him. This caught the attention of John Lennon, who responded by penning a letter to Danny (phone number at the Dakota included), signed "Love, John & Yoko," and sending it to the magazine, where it sat in limbo for decades. (This really happened to a singer named Steve Tilston.)

Here's where the Hollywood kicks in, courtesy of Dan Fogelman (writer of "Crazy Stupid Love" and Cars," making his directorial debut and laying it on thick). When his manager, Frank (Christopher Plummer), finds the letter online, buys it and gives it to him as a birthday gift, it shakes up Danny, who vows to change his life. He quits his lucrative tour and holes up in a hotel in New Jersey, not far from the grown son he has never known (the product of a one-night stand with a groupie).

Pacino portrays the scarf-sporting Danny as perpetually dancing along the fine line between charm and smarm. Danny ditches the model-pretty girlfriend half his age and instead flirts with the more age-appropriate manager of the hotel, Mary (Annette Bening). He also shmoozes the aw-shucks yokel millennials who work at the hotel. He has a $30,000 Steinway rolled into his modest hotel room and sets about penning a new song.

Danny barges in on the row-house bliss of his son, Tom (Bobby Cannavale), and pregnant wife Samantha (Jennifer Garner) and precocious 7-year-old hyperactive daughter Sophie (a delightfully manic Catarina Cas). Tom is a blue-collar noble who has never accepted a penny from his famous dad. But he's got a secret that serves as the major plot fulcrum that just might bring him and his father closer. Meantime, Danny starts showering the family with his rock-star riches and preparing to unveil the reinvented singer/songwriter.

Pacino goes all-in here, digging around for at least the appearance of emotional depth to go along with the banter. Danny pleasantly hounds Mary for a dinner date, and you don't mind that the "patter" between them barely disguises the dueling between two fine actors. (This is sort of Bening's Annie Hall.) Pacino/Danny finds an engaging rapport with everyone around him, and he makes the film sail along briskly.

The supporting crew is strong. Cannavale and Garner salvage uncomfortable roles. The secret weapons are Nick Offerman, in a cameo during an opening flashback scene, and Plummer as the sardonic manager and best pal, providing wisdom and one-liners. And the soundtrack is awash in original Lennon songs, and not just obvious choices like "Imagine," but nuggets like "Love" and "Nobody Told Me."

This is fluff that could be easily dismissed. And it sure gets corny as hell at times, especially as Fogelman clumsily syncs his themes into a fairly tidy (but believable) ending. But there's something genuine here -- not just the origin story, but also the heart and grit that everyone involved invests in the production.

I laughed, I cried. I totally fell for it.