Spotlight

Spotlight Date: 28-October-07
Spoiler Rating: Medium

After Hours (1985)

Did you ever hear the parable about the man who thought his house made too much noise? The door creaked, the floor squeaked, the gate clattered, etc., so he sought advice from a wise old man. Over several visits the wise man told him to buy a cow, a cat, a donkey, and so on until his house was filled with animals. But it was even more noisy than before! The man angrily complained to the wise man, who told him to get rid of the cow, then the cat, then the donkey, and so on until he had no more animals. Then ... ahhhh. The man's house seemed nice and quiet.

Martin Scorsese's black comedy "After Hours" reminds me of that tale. Instead of a man with a creaking house we have Paul Hackett (Griffin Dunne), a nondescript New Yorker whose problem is that his home and life are too quiet. By day he toils as a word processor in corporate cubeland (a job his trainee scorns); by night he sits alone in a barren apartment or coffee shop. He has no pets to distract him, only books. One evening an attractive woman (Rosanna Arquette) begins talking to him over her coffee cup. Their conversation is brief but she gives him the phone number of the friend's loft where she is staying. Eager to relieve his situation, Paul calls her later that night. She invites him down to Soho, beyond his little sphere and out into the city where humanity surges and seethes and never sleeps. He is in for quite a ride.

Before he is delivered to work the next morning — broke, battered, and covered in paper maché — Paul endures myriad adventures which would make any man long for unexceptional, monotonous solitude. Poor Paul does not get lucky with his new friend (such a modest quest) since she appears to have mental and physical issues. Nor does he succeed at making time with her sexy host (Linda Fiorentino). In the wee hours other women (Teri Garr, Catherine O'Hara) throw themselves at him, but he lacks the drive to follow through. Is it because he is exhausted and wants to go home by then, or is it because they're both crazy? Some strangers do offer welcome assistance (John Heard, Verna Bloom), but with dangerous strings attached. Maybe the jaunty thieves (Cheech and Chong) have it right: better to connect with people in the anonymous way of a predator or spectator than to try to get involved.

Perhaps surprisingly, Scorsese's kinetic flair jibes perfectly with the script's sick humor. This is the director's New York, after all, where anything goes. Yet nothing in the hero's odyssey is entirely unbelievable, and none of the night owls he meets are without a sympathetic core. Turns out the "life" that people like Paul are supposed to get is pretty messed up. Lots of people are floundering in different ways. You might be tempted to cry if it weren't so funny (a fact which Dunne's wonderful expressions won't let you forget). "After Hours" is a marvelous trip through hell that makes you both laugh and grimace — and might even make you glad if your life is dull.

Copyright © 2007 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.