Posts

Showing posts from January 9, 2009

Last Chance Harvey Sweetly Maddening

The best thing about the film, Last Chance Harvey , is the acting. What's not to like about a cast such as this: Dustin Hoffman , Emma Thompson , Eileen Aitken , Richard Schiff , Kathy Baker ? Then there's the added bonus of seeing an actress of your blogstress's vintage playing a romantic lead. How often does that happen? Joel Hopkins 's script manages to give off warm and fuzzy feelings despite the fact that it hangs together by only the thinnest of threads. We are asked to suspend disbelief and curiosity throughout the film. Never are we to truly know why the Hoffman character's daughter possesses such contempt for him that she pushes him to the very margins or her wedding. "I wasn't a good father," is about all Harvey Shine, the character played by Hoffman, gives us to chew on, and the script nowhere fills in the blanks. Following the travails of Shine, a washed-up musician on the verge of losing his jingle-writing job, we are asked to believ