November 18, 2007 -- “Starting Out in the Evening” is a very literate movie about authors and literary criticism. It has sharp dialogue and strong acting, but not much dramatic energy. Come Oscar time, this film's main claim to fame will be Frank Langella's finely nuanced performance as an author nearing the end of his life and career who is still determined to maintain his high literary standards and his dignity.

Frank Langella's (“Superman Returns”) character, author Leonard Schiller, is a quiet, dignified man who has been working on his last novel for 10 years. It is not going well. Following a heart attack the year before, he is more vulnerable than he would like. He also knows that the market for his book may have gone away years ago. Publishers have told him his kind of book is no longer marketable. He worries about his daughter, Ariel (played by Lili Taylor of “Factotum” and “Six Feet Under”). She's 40 years old, wants a child, but can't find a husband. She announces that she's trying for a baby with her boyfriend, and the husband part will just have to wait. This doesn't go over well with Leonard. Heather (Lauren Ambrose of “Six Feet Under”), a pretty college student, contacts Leonard, requesting to interview him for a thesis she is working on about Leonard's novels.

Although Leonard suspects that Heather's thesis will have a superficial analysis of his work based on his biography rather than the books themselves, he allows himself to be seduced by Heather's charms. Their conversations about books reveals a lot about the two characters. Heather identifies strongly with Leonard's first two novels, not with his third and fourth novels, apparently because her life experience and Leonard's diverge at that point. Heather mistakenly thinks that Leonard has abandoned some ideal he once had. Leonard tries to explain that the characters in his novels can't behave falsely, or in some artificially constrained way. His characters are informed by his own life experiences, but they are true to themselves and are not under his control. Heather, the only one of the three main characters whose life is young and full of promise, can't understand the world view of a man who is facing eternity.

In the end. Leonard is hurt and more fragile than ever, but he has an unexpected inner strength, and a burning desire to keep writing. He shows startling strength in a final confrontation with Heather. Ariel also shows some strength in her confrontation with her old flame Casey (Adrian Lester (“Scenes of a Sexual Nature”) who loves her but doesn't want children. Ariel announces she is done compromising with him on the matter of children. In essence, Ariel, Leonard and Heather all refuse to compromise in the end. This leads to success, failure and heartache, but each of them remains unbowed. This determination in the face of overwhelming odds reminds me of the great Bob Seeger song, “The Fire Inside:”

Youth and beauty are gone one day
No matter what you dream or feel or say
It ends in dust and disarray ...
Dreams die hard and we watch them erode
But we cannot be denied
The fire inside

While the film has some great acting in it, particularly by Langella, the drama in the basic story is underpowered, more of a whimper than a bang. The other thing the film has going for it is it's sharp, literary dialogue. The screenplay, by writer-director Andrew Wagner and Fred Parnes, is adapted from the novel by Brian Morton. The resulting film is a mixed bag. At one point in the film, Leonard says his style of writing is to establish characters and then follow them to see if they do anything interesting. This film comes a little too close to following characters who don't do anything very interesting. This film rates a C+.

Click here for links to places to buy or rent this movie in video and/or DVD format, or to buy the soundtrack, posters, books, even used videos, games, electronics and lots of other stuff. I suggest you shop at least two of these places before buying anything. Prices seem to vary continuously. For more information on this film, click on this link to The Internet Movie Database. Type in the name of the movie in the search box and press enter. You will be able to find background information on the film, the actors, and links to much more information.

Copyright © 2007 Robert Roten. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

Robert Roten can be reached via e-mail at .