An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn
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''An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn'' is a 2018
crime comedy film Crime films, in the broadest sense, is a film genre inspired by and analogous to the crime fiction literary genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and its detection. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine ...
directed by
Jim Hosking Jim Hosking is a British film director. His first short film, ''Little Clumps of Hair'', premiered on BBC Three. His short film ''Renegades'' premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2010. He directed the segment "G is for Grandad" for the ...
, starring
Aubrey Plaza Aubrey Christina Plaza (born June 26, 1984) is an American actress, comedian, and producer. She began her career performing improv and sketch comedy at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater. She starred as April Ludgate on the NBC sitcom ''Pa ...
,
Emile Hirsch Emile Davenport Hirsch (born March 13, 1985) is an American actor. He played Chris McCandless in '' Into the Wild'' (2007). Other notable film roles include '' The Girl Next Door'' (2004), ''Lords of Dogtown'' (2005), ''Alpha Dog'' (2006), ''Spe ...
,
Jemaine Clement Jemaine Atea Mahana Clement (born 10 January 1974) is a New Zealand actor, comedian, musician and filmmaker. He has released several albums with Bret McKenzie as the musical comedy duo Flight of the Conchords, and created a comedy series of th ...
, Matt Berry, and Craig Robinson.


Plot

Lulu Danger is a waitress in a coffee shop managed by her husband, Shane, in a small town. One evening while watching television, Lulu sees an advertisement for a mysterious, upcoming live show to be held at the town's hotel called ''An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn; For One Magical Night Only''. She recognizes Beverly from photos she keeps hidden in a dresser drawer and gets excited. Meanwhile, Shane becomes incensed when he learns that Lulu's brother, Adjay, has more money than him and that he keeps his life's savings in a lockbox at his spice store. With the help of his dimwitted employees, Carl and Tyrone, Shane steals the lockbox, though Adjay quickly recognizes him as the culprit. Later, at the laundromat, decrying his situation, Adjay meets a drifter named Colin who offers to retrieve the lockbox in exchange for $200. Colin goes to the Dangers', where Lulu catches him snooping outside and mistakes him for a friend of Shane's. He pulls a gun on Shane and demands the lockbox, but, when he panics, Lulu takes charge, taking the gun from Colin, retrieving the lockbox, and forcing him to drive her to the hotel. Colin and Lulu check in, where they both awkwardly and bizarrely flirt. Beverly checks into the hotel along with his sidekick, a Scottish man named Rodney. He and Lulu immediately recognize one another, though Beverly—who appears to be subverbal and communicates only through a series of grunts— does not indicate this to Rodney, who secretly harbors feelings for him. Behind Rodney's back, Beverly attempts to arrange a meeting with Lulu via a note, but Rodney intercepts it and drugs him. When she arrives to meet Beverly, she instead finds Rodney wearing synchronized swimming makeup; he tells her not to come between him and Beverly. On the night of the show, Beverly apparently falls ill and the event is postponed for 24 hours, then for another day as Colin, Lulu, Beverly, and Rodney all jockey for one another's affections and Shane arrives at the hotel in search of the lockbox. The show's nature remains elusive and guests speculate as to what it will entail. A despondent Colin has sex with a woman he meets in the hotel bar, only to learn that she's a prostitute. Later, he confesses the liaison to Lulu, upsetting her. Colin further confesses he had been a virgin up until then. Later, demanding to know the reason for Lulu's fixation on Beverly, she confesses that he was her college poetry professor and that he left his wife for her; in the midst of their affair, he apparently drowned while they were on vacation, an event which emotionally destroyed her. Lulu, Colin, and other guests gather for the show, which is a simple musical revue in which Rodney and Beverly perform whimsical Scottish folk melodies. Beverly suddenly becomes articulate, singing in an incongruous alto and regaling the audience with stories of his time visiting Scotland. Addressing Lulu, he gives a heartfelt speech about lost love, apologizing for breaking her heart and telling Rodney that, while he loves him as a friend, he has no romantic feelings for him. The event ends when Shane and Carl crash the show while Tyrone steals the lockbox from Colin's room. A fight erupts between Colin, Shane, Carl, and hotel security. Following Beverly to his room, Lulu demands to know why Beverly faked his death. He confesses that the decision was impulsive and that he didn't really have a reason. Beverly further admits everything he says onstage is similarly impulsive and that he's unsure he meant anything he said. A heartbroken Lulu leaves. Lulu and Colin meet in the hotel bar, where she tries to make amends for her treatment of him. When F.R. David's "
Words A word is a basic element of language that carries an objective or practical meaning, can be used on its own, and is uninterruptible. Despite the fact that language speakers often have an intuitive grasp of what a word is, there is no conse ...
" begins to play—a song neither have heard before—Lulu invites Colin onto the dance floor and they share an exuberant dance that abruptly ends with her jumping into his arms. Later they return to their room to have sex, but Lulu falls asleep while Colin undresses. As he gets into bed, Lulu wakes up and they tell each other “I love you.”


Cast

*
Aubrey Plaza Aubrey Christina Plaza (born June 26, 1984) is an American actress, comedian, and producer. She began her career performing improv and sketch comedy at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater. She starred as April Ludgate on the NBC sitcom ''Pa ...
as Lulu Danger *
Emile Hirsch Emile Davenport Hirsch (born March 13, 1985) is an American actor. He played Chris McCandless in '' Into the Wild'' (2007). Other notable film roles include '' The Girl Next Door'' (2004), ''Lords of Dogtown'' (2005), ''Alpha Dog'' (2006), ''Spe ...
as Shane Danger *
Jemaine Clement Jemaine Atea Mahana Clement (born 10 January 1974) is a New Zealand actor, comedian, musician and filmmaker. He has released several albums with Bret McKenzie as the musical comedy duo Flight of the Conchords, and created a comedy series of th ...
as Colin Keith Threadener * Matt Berry as Rodney Von Donkensteiger * Craig Robinson as Beverly Luff Linn * Zachary Cherry as Tyrone Paris * Sky Elobar as Carl Ronk *
Jacob Wysocki Jacob Wysocki (born June 20, 1990) is an American actor and comedian. Life and career Wysocki became interested in acting while still in high school. During these years, he also performed with ComedySportz and started to act in school plays. Af ...
as Lawrence Doggi * Sam Dissanayake as Adjay Willis *
Maria Bamford Maria Bamford (born September 3, 1970) is an American actress and stand-up comedian. Her work has drawn critical acclaim and controversy because her humor often uses self-deprecating and dark topics, including her dysfunctional family, depressio ...
as The Elegant Woman * John Kerry as Kennedy Gordon * Russ Burd as Barry Ofeld * Carl Solomon as DJ Valerie Grillz * Bettina Devin as Paulette * Bruce J. Paz as The Captain * Michael D. Cohen as Mitch Stemp * Gil Gex as Myra Paris * Kirsten Krieg as Hilda * Luis Molina as Edwin * Michael St. Michaels as Rupert Rumbini


Production

In February 2017, it was announced
Aubrey Plaza Aubrey Christina Plaza (born June 26, 1984) is an American actress, comedian, and producer. She began her career performing improv and sketch comedy at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater. She starred as April Ludgate on the NBC sitcom ''Pa ...
,
Emile Hirsch Emile Davenport Hirsch (born March 13, 1985) is an American actor. He played Chris McCandless in '' Into the Wild'' (2007). Other notable film roles include '' The Girl Next Door'' (2004), ''Lords of Dogtown'' (2005), ''Alpha Dog'' (2006), ''Spe ...
,
Jemaine Clement Jemaine Atea Mahana Clement (born 10 January 1974) is a New Zealand actor, comedian, musician and filmmaker. He has released several albums with Bret McKenzie as the musical comedy duo Flight of the Conchords, and created a comedy series of th ...
, Matt Berry and Craig Robinson had been cast for the film; that
Jim Hosking Jim Hosking is a British film director. His first short film, ''Little Clumps of Hair'', premiered on BBC Three. His short film ''Renegades'' premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2010. He directed the segment "G is for Grandad" for the ...
would direct from a screenplay he wrote with David Wike. Sam Bisbee, Theodora Dunlap, Lucas Toh, Emily Leo and Andy Starke were its producers, and
David Gordon Green David Gordon Green is an American filmmaker. He directed the dramas ''George Washington'' (2000), '' All the Real Girls'' (2003), and '' Snow Angels'' (2007), as well as the thriller '' Undertow'' (2004), all of which he wrote or co-wrote. In ...
, Hosking, Richard Garber and
Lance Acord Lance Acord (born September 9, 1964) A.S.C.American Society of Cinematographers.
the executive producers under their Park Pictures, Rook Films, Wigwam Films, and Film4 Productions banners, respectively. The film was shot on location in
Eureka Eureka (often abbreviated as E!, or Σ!) is an intergovernmental organisation for research and development funding and coordination. Eureka is an open platform for international cooperation in innovation. Organisations and companies applying th ...
,
Arcata Arcata (; Wiyot: ''Goudi’ni''; Yurok: ''Oket'oh'') is a city adjacent to the Arcata Bay (northern) portion of Humboldt Bay in Humboldt County, California, United States. At the 2020 census, Arcata's population was 18,857. Arcata was first ...
and
Fortuna Fortuna ( la, Fortūna, equivalent to the Greek goddess Tyche) is the goddess of fortune and the personification of luck in Roman religion who, largely thanks to the Late Antique author Boethius, remained popular through the Middle Ages until at ...
,
California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
, in early 2017. The
Eureka Inn The Eureka Inn in Eureka, California is a four-story, 104-room Elizabethan Tudor Revival architectural style hotel, which opened in 1922. In February 1982, the structure was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 2004, the inn w ...
appeared as "The Moorhouse Hotel" in the film.


Release

The film premiered at the
2018 Sundance Film Festival The 2018 Sundance Film Festival took place from January 18 to January 28, 2018. The first lineup of competition films was announced on November 29, 2017. Awards The following awards were presented: * U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury Prize Award: '' Th ...
. In May 2018,
Universal Pictures Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Ameri ...
acquired its North American distribution rights, and released it in the United States on October 19, 2018. It was released in the United Kingdom on October 23, 2018, by
Picturehouse Entertainment Picturehouse Cinemas is a network of cinemas in the United Kingdom, operated by Picturehouse Cinemas Ltd and owned by Cineworld. The company runs its own film distribution arm, Picturehouse Entertainment, which has released acclaimed films su ...
.


Critical response

''An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn'' received mixed reviews from film critics. It holds approval rating on review aggregation website
Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, based on reviews, with an average score of . The site's critical consensus reads, "''An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn'' unites an intriguing array of comedic talents for a thoroughly unusual outing that proves itself disappointingly difficult to recommend." On
Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...
, the film holds a rating of 54 out of 100, based on 17 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Writing for ''Empire'', critic Kim Newman recognized the potentially polarizing nature of the film, stating "...most of the slow-burn strangeness is a hoot. Some will find this impenetrable and irritating, but audiences willing to tune into Hosking's off-kilter style will be moved by the ridiculous love stories and relish the hilarious eccentricity."


References


External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Evening with Beverly Luff Linn 2018 comedy films 2018 crime films 2010s crime comedy films 2010s English-language films American crime comedy films British crime comedy films Film4 Productions films Films set in California Films shot in California Universal Pictures films 2010s American films 2010s British films