| Love Comes Lately | |
|---|---|
DVD cover |
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| Directed by | Jan Schütte |
| Produced by | Alex Gibney Martin Hagemann W. Wilder Knight II |
| Screenplay by | Jan Schütte |
| Based on | The Briefcase, Alone and Old Love[1] by Isaac Bashevis Singer |
| Starring | Otto Tausig Rhea Perlman Olivia Thirlby |
| Music by | Henning Lohner |
| Cinematography | Edward Kłosiński Chris Squires |
| Editing by | Katja Dringenberg Renate Merck |
| Studio | Zero Fiction Film |
| Distributed by | Kino International |
| Release date(s) | 9 September 2007 (T.I.F.F.) |
| Running time | 86 min. |
| Country | Austria Germany USA |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $77,458 (USA) |
Love Comes Lately is a 2007 film written for the screen and directed by Jan Schütte. The film is based on the short stories of Isaac Bashevis Singer.
Contents |
Elderly Jewish writer Max Kohn (Otto Tausig) is an Austrian émigré whose mind is constantly working causing a state of perpetual confusion. He's a successful author of short stories who lives in New York City and is so stuck in his old ways that he believes that the only proper way to write is by using a typewriter. Max has several women interested in seducing him, but he spends most of his time with fellow worrier Reisel (Rhea Perlman). During a trip to speak in nearby Hanover Max begins editing his latest story -- a wild tale of a Miami retiree who gets himself into various kinds of trouble. It doesn't take Max long to lose himself in his own writings, and pretty soon, he's mixed up in two sexy romances and an unsolved murder.
Upon returning to reality, Max begins to feel as if his own written words have begun to manifest themselves. A meeting with burned out former student Rosalie (Barbara Hershey), with whom he shares a mutual attraction, follows, and later while heading to Springfield for another unwanted speaking engagement Max discovers that he has lost the speech he prepared. After a series of small adventures, Max decides to start writing a new story based on his recent life and featuring a protagonist named Harry -- a thinly veiled stand-in himself.
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Otto Tausig | Max Kohn |
| Rhea Perlman | Reisel |
| John C. Vennema | Dr. Grosskopf |
| Olivia Thirlby | Sylvia Brokeles |
| Bunny Levine | M.N. |
| Brian Doyle-Murray | Boss |
| Elizabeth Peña | Esperanza |
| Barbara Hershey | Rosalie |
| Gurdeep Singh | H.P. |
| Tovah Feldshuh | Ethel |
| Lee Wilkof | Professor Meyer |
The film received a score of 70% on rotten tomatoes, indicating pretty good reviews.
From Nathan Lee at The New York Times:
| “ | Max Kohn (Otto Tausig), the aging Lothario of “Love Comes Lately,” is very much like the movie itself: doddering and milquetoasty, but ultimately disarming. Blending three short stories by the Nobel laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer, the filmmaker Jan Schütte may well have made a minor classic for the retired-Jews-of-Miami set.[1] | ” |
From Wesley Morris at The Boston Globe:
| “ | The writer and director Jan Schütte has distilled three Isaac Bashevis Singer stories into a mild 80-or-so-minute project whose length matches its hero's age. The idea's not terrible, and no filmmaker has bothered with Singer for years, but this movie chooses to reduce the author's soulfulness to mirrored tales of lonely, randy seniors, all of whom Tausig plays. In one sense, it's a disservice. Imagine a film based on some James Baldwin writings whose conclusion was: Boy, he was frisky. In another, the movie does get at a certain woe that's true to Singer's work.[2] | ” |
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