Filmmaker Chris Weitz has taken a ride on a rather inconsistent career path since making a splash (along with brother Paul) with 1999’s “American Pie.” He followed that raunchy comedy with the critically mauled Chris Rock starrer “Down to Earth” before bouncing back with the beloved intimate romantic comedy “About a Boy.” He then fled to the arms of big budget filmmaking with 2007’s “The Golden Compass” and last year’s “The Twilight Saga: New Moon.” This year brings an effort hearkening back to the character-driven work of his early career, “A Better Life,” which premieres at the Los Angeles Film Festival next week.
The film could be read as a riff on Vittorio De Sica’s “The Bicycle Thieves,” though transplanted in Los Angeles with a heavy dose of Mexican-American culture. But it’s unfair to hold it up to that agreed-upon masterpiece of neorealist cinema. Yes, the films share some plot details — “A Better Life” tells the story of an undocumented Mexican landscaper who purchases a truck and equipment to start his own business, hoping to make a better future for him and his street-smart son, only to have it stolen — but it is a successful piece of slice-of-life dramatic filmmaking that was a breath of fresh air for Weitz after his blockbuster detour.