‘Last Chance Harvey’ is all about Emma

Alonso Duralde Film critic

If there’s such a thing as the Laptop Lotto for screenwriters, “Last Chance Harvey” writer-director Joel Hopkins hit the Superball. Hopkins, best known for his award-winning 1998 short film “Jorge,” somehow scored Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson for a screenplay that, by rights, should have snagged Daniel Hugh Kelly and Catherine Oxenberg before winding up on one of the channels you’d ignore on a trans-Atlantic airline.

Hoffman stars as Harvey, a composer of jingles for TV commercials, who’s at a professional and personal crossroads. His career seems to be sputtering to a halt — a producer actually says to him, in the movie’s very first scene, “There are no more chances, Harvey.” — and he’s completely estranged from his daughter, whose wedding in London prompts him to travel overseas.

Once Harvey arrives at the wedding, we see what an outsider he has become in his own family; the second husband (James Brolin) of his wife (Kathy Baker) is the de facto father of the bride, and Harvey is merely an awkward interloper. Just when he’s about to throw in the towel and go back to the States, he crosses paths with Kate (Emma Thompson), a lonely Brit whose clinging mother (Eileen Atkins) has made it impossible for her to find a man.

Quick facts Starring: Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson, James Brolin, Kathy Baker Director: Joel Hopkins Run time: 1 hour, 32 minutes MPAA rating: PG-13

You can pretty much map out what happens from here: Harvey and Kate rub each other the wrong way. They cross paths again and are more civil to each other. They discover they enjoy each other’s company. A manufactured conflict arises to keep them apart. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Given that Hopkins has one of the world’s most photogenic cities as his backdrop, you might expect “Last Chance Harvey” to have an enchanting look about it, but the cinematography by John de Borman is flagrantly unremarkable. The Los Angeles of “Yes Man” seems a more romantic and inviting city than the Old Blighty we’re shown here.

Video   Dustin Hoffman Dec. 22: TODAY’s Matt Lauer talks to actor Dustin Hoffman about his new film “Last Chance Harvey.” Today show

If there’s one reason to sit through “Harvey” when it turns up on cable (or on that trans-Atlantic flight), it’s the always-watchable Thompson, who somehow makes us believe that someone who walks, talks and looks like Emma Thompson could be starved for male companionship. One scene featuring Kate on a disastrous blind date is a little masterpiece of melancholy, with Thompson starting out the meeting with gusto before gradually shrinking back into the scenery.

Hoffman, if anything, does too good a job at making Harvey into a pathetic loser at the beginning of the film — so much so that it’s hard to buy his redemption at Kate’s hands. You can’t help thinking that we’re being spared a fourth act in which Harvey screws up yet another relationship and leaves another woman in tears.

But then, bad choices seem to be contagious — “Last Chance Harvey” certainly won’t rank among the better script selections made by this impressive cast.

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