with releases from 2008.
I'm a sucker for a good Brit flick and anything tinged with melancholy. I like Emma Thompson. This movie was going to be catnip for me. I knew it wasn't much, but for 10:30 a.m. on a U.K.-gray Friday, I thought it would be just right. And it was.
More deeply felt than one might expect, Last Chance Harvey pairs lonely souls Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson in a slight yet tender romance. Harvey Shine (Hoffman) comes to London for his somewhat estranged daughter's wedding, only to be let go from his jingle-writing gig and shunted to the side at the nuptials. His return to New York thwarted, Harvey strikes up conversation with greeter Kate (Thompson) in an airport bar, and they progress - OK, he pushes, she relents - to a day of exploration and reconciliation. That's it, save a third-act contrivance that pads the 99-minute film.
Last Chance Harvey has the feel of an extended Love, Actually segment; several typical London sights recur in both movies. While his filming style isn't much, writer/director Joel Hopkins has given us two real grown-ups and two talented actors to play them.
Hoffman tones down recent mannered performances (Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer) to portray a man of desperation and yearning, sad about being an embarrassment to his family. Although Kate doesn't have the same arc, Thompson grasps her character's pain in one image: On an awkward blind date in a pub, she escapes to a bathroom stall to dab her eyes and choke back sobs. Her closest companion is her cellphone and the codependent mother (Eileen Atkins) attached to it.
On these cold, raw days, grab tea and a scone and take a chance on the sweet poignancy of Harvey.
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