Yes, the performances of Billy Crystal and Alan King are very showy, but they are cliches of that type of character, not real people. After a while, it begins to get tiresome watching them go through their antics. Crystal is a successful New York doctor who plays the trumpet in surgery, and after a medical issue of his own decides to reach out to his estranged father King who was working as an extra in Hollywood, and one of the most disliked ones on the set. His constant interruptions are an annoyance to directors and actors and crew, and Crystal gets to witness it first hand. His girlfriend JoBeth Williams encourages him to try to further make amends, but when you've got someone so demanding as King, that's going to be a very difficult decision to make and stick with. But an aneurysm on his brain has Crystal sticking around, so there's a lot of schmaltzy dialog between the two that considering their long-term relationship begins to get cumbersome.

The two actors individually are funny, and in small doses, together, they do get a few laughs. But after a while, it seems like they're trying to outdo each other or impress each other in character, and any efforts for pathos is difficult to deal. Williams, while very good, doesn't look deep into the reality of the situation, and overall, it's obvious that both of these characters as father and son are engaged very self-centered and narcissistic, and not really worth rooting for in the context of a movie. Director Henry Winkler obviously was too confident in the two actors and just let them go without reigning them in at all, while a good knife and Sharpie would have worked wonders on editing out the corny parts of the script. It's not horrible, but after a while, it gets to be a bit too much. A cameo by Sean Connery is cute but unnecessary, and scenes on the sets of a daytime soap opera don't ring true. Janet Carroll of "Murphy Brown" is always a welcome present, but she doesn't get nearly enough to do.

Abbie (Billy Crystal) is a surgeon who just had a heart attack. On his on again off again girlfriend Lisa (JoBeth Williams)'s insistence, he visits his estranged father Abe (Alan King). Abe is a failed actor/extra who is slowly suffering from dementia.

Henry Winkler directs this movie. He doesn't really have any vision or style. All he does is just turn on the camera and let the actors go. And that's what Alan King does. He's manic. He's powerful. Billy Crystal is playing the angry young man trying to reconnect with his crazy father.

The pace is slow and cumbersome. The jokes come fast and deliver flat. Everybody is grumpy. I hoped the movie to be better. I'm pulling for them. But Crystal is just too grumpy.

The stuff about being an extra just doesn't ring true. It may seem right if you don't think about it. But if an extra keeps causing trouble, he'd be quickly kicked off the set.

It's hard to understand, sometimes, what can go wrong in the relationship between a father and son, when no physical abuse is involved. We know these situations do exist, as it the case presented by this movie that tries hard to presents a situation about the distancing between a son and his father, two people that are much alike.

Billy Crystal, working on the screen play with Eric Roth, try to make us like this story. As directed by Henry Winkler, this dramatic comedy doesn't add anything that one hasn't already seen already. In fact, most of it kept reminding us the work of Neil Simon with all its one liners and glibness.

"Memories of Me" makes a point to salute those unknown people working behind the stars because Abe, the father of this story is a struggling extra in Hollywood. The movie capitalizes on the star turn by Alan King, who plays the father. Billy Crystal underplays the son. Jobeth Williams also appears.

Mr. Winkler has gone for the sentimentality and the result is a film that doesn't go anywhere.