Buddy Visalo believes in the American Dream.

The trouble is, he's not really sure how to make it come true and the mistakes he makes threatens his chances.

Nevertheless, weary of missed opportunities and burdened with the pain of a self esteem-slaying wife Estelle and his friends, the Staten Island blue-collar worker invests in a fixer-upper of a duplex that looks like it would be better off razed.

His business plan is little more than a whim -- he and his wife will live upstairs and he'll convert the downstairs to "Buddy's Tavern" no, maybe "Buddy's Bar." He's really not sure of the name just yet. It's the least of his worries.

Accentuating the positive, Buddy foolishly ignores the money pit's risks.

The $80 a month rent he'll get during the conversion will pay the mortgage. Existing zoning laws allow the downstairs conversion without a special variance. Unfortunately, he inherits deadbeat tenants he doesn't know how to evict and the seller says the plumbing is almost new.

"I put it in myself three years ago," the seller says. His hands are soft as putty and he doesn't have a permit.

Buddy is stuck with a stigmatized "Two Family House," in a movie with the same name which tells the human story of chasing dreams.

In the end, it takes a generation before Buddy's hopes really reach fruition -- no thanks to his approach.

Buddy's strategy to investing in real estate is not the studied, business-like approach it should be, but it is the stuff of movies and last year this one earned the Audience Award for the "Best Dramatic Film" at Sundance 2000.

By award-winning writer-director Raymond Defelitta and featuring a cool jazz soundtrack by the John Pizzarelli Trio, "Two Family House" is one of those rare 50s period pieces that gets it right.

That's due, in part, to a solid cast that includes seasoned actors from the cable TV hit series "Sopranos," Michael Rispoli (Buddy Visalo) and Katherine Narducci (Estelle Visalo).

Now available on DVD and video, "Two Family House" is a work of cinematic art, but as a property investor, the film's lead character is a real piece of work.

Apparently, the special zoning variance that allows the downstairs business, also includes a grandfather clause that prohibits Buddy from evicting his tenants for a year.

Buddy, who obviously didn't adequately research the property, relies upon his friends' baseball bat brandishing mob mentality to evict the non-paying tenants -- a pregnant wife Mary O'Neary (played by Kelly MacDonald) and Jim O'Neary (played by Kevin Conway), her much older, alcoholic, abusive husband who doesn't think twice about relieving himself in the back yard.

The threat of violence doesn't budge the tenants, but Mary goes into labor, giving birth to an interracial baby, much to Jim's chagrin. The abusive husband, previously unaware of his wife's infidelity, is shocked into making a hasty retreat and a welcomed exit.

Buddy begins to make matters worse by pondering racial discrimination as an eviction strategy, and later compounds his potential for liability in an adulterous affair with Mary that could get him sued for divorce and for landlord-tenant sexual harassment.

Meanwhile, Buddy's wife has her own agenda. Estelle is so unsupportive of anything other than living at her mother's house (but in a twist, co-dependently supportive of her husband's affair) that she neglects to tell him the mortgage lender has sent a notice warning that if they continue to spend two and a half times as much as they are saving they will lose their home and their investment.

Estelle also conveniently forgets to tell Buddy she's responsible for draining the household coffers in her bid to turn his dream into a nightmare.

"You don't know nothing about owning a house or about running a bar. You don't just do these things because you feel like it," she says, half right.

"You gotta have the brains for it," she adds with contempt.

Buddy eventually discovers Estelle's scheme and turns to his hard-work ethics to keep his dream alive. Working an additional night shift factory job, he keeps his day job to make up for the squandered cash.

"I gotta do what it takes. This one can't go in the tank," he says, recalling his wife's nagging reminders that, in her eyes, he's a bum.

Buddy, however, knows bums don't have dreams.

"We own our own home. We own our own business. Jesus, Estelle. This is America. Where are you living? This is the point," he says in preparation for a final, misguided run at hope, his own business and a home he can call his own.

For more articles by Broderick Perkins, please press here.

Published: July 30, 2001

Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright laws.

A journalist for 35-years, Broderick Perkins parlayed an old-school daily newspaper career into a digital news service offering editorial content and consulting services. Perkins' San Jose, CA-based DeadlineNews Group includes the flagship news site, DeadlineNews.Com, offering real estate, personal finance and consumer journalism, and a backshop, the Deadline Newsroom.