Dodge and Penny have the unfortunate fate of falling in love at the end of the world. If only they had met years ago, they say as they gaze into each other’s eyes as time draws to a close. They would have loved each other longer, but would they have loved each other more? What matters isn’t the length of time two people spend together, but that they make the most of the moments they have.
The trailer for “Seeking a Friend for the End of the World” bills the movie as a comedy, and while there are a lot of laughs - a gag near the end about daylight savings time is one of the funniest lines I have heard in a movie in years - it is generally a small, contemplative film about how we spend our time, about our compulsions as creatures of habit, about our need to connect with another person, about the fragility of life and about how someday, all of this is going to end. Whether or not you think that sounds like a good time at the movies depends on your perspective. I rather liked it.
“Seeking a Friend” opens with shocking news: In three weeks, a massive asteroid will strike the Earth and wipe out all life on the planet. Despite its setup, the movie is not an effects-laden blockbuster, meaning we don’t get any shots of the space rock hurtling toward its doomed target. Instead, we see Dodge going through his daily routine as an insurance salesman as news reports about the end of the world loop in the background.
Doug doesn’t feel compelled to go on a hedonistic pleasure binge or find someone to die with. His wife left him for her boyfriend the second she heard about the asteroid, and there’s no point in going to work anymore, so he essentially curls up to die. But fate has different plans.
Dodge and Penny meet one night as she’s crying on the fire escape outside the window of his apartment. She’s just kicked her boyfriend out of their place and is upset about never seeing her family in England again. He consoles her, and she gives him a letter from his high school sweetheart that had wound up in her mailbox.
When a riot erupts outside the building in which they live, Doug tells Penny he knows someone who can take her to England, and they escape together and embark on a road trip. Their journey takes him to the home of his high school sweetheart, to one of her former boyfriends and to the one who can take Penny to England. It also takes them closer to each other.
A sense of desperate hope pervades “Seeking a Friend.” I wanted the ending to be different from what the title told me it would be. But it would be better to watch the movie with an eye on where the characters are rather than where they are headed. By not allowing Doug and Penny to resolve their issues from the past, and by offering them no hope for the future, writer and director Lorene Scafaria forces his characters to pour all of their energy into the moment at hand. It’s all they have.
There is no actor better than Steve Carell to play Dodge. Carell is the go-to man for hapless, lovable sad sacks, so I felt as though I knew Doug the moment I saw him. This economy of character development is important, since time is of the essence. And I love the way Keira Knightley clings to an armful of records. It’s a wonderful metaphor for Penny refusing to let go of something that’s dead and gone. (When did you last buy a record?)
“Seeking a Friend” is an effective, well-written emotional drama laced with clever humor. Movies like it pass under the public’s radar too easily, but I hope you’ll see it. As far as I know, there’s no asteroid hurtling toward Earth, but you still want to watch movies that count.
Rated R for language, including sexual references, drug use and brief violence. Three stars out of four. Email David Laprad at dlaprad@hamiltoncountyherald.com.