SENIOR LOVE TRIANGLE
director/writer: Kelly Blatz; screenwriter: book by Isadora Kosofsky; cinematographer: John Keng; editor: Kelly Blatz/Seth Clark ; music: Nami Melumad; cast: Travis Van Winkle (Spencer), Tom Bower (William Selig), Matt Bush (Ignacio), Anne Gee Byrd (Adina), Marlyn Mason (Jeanie), Michelle C. Bonilla (Julia); Runtime: 92; MPAA Rating: NR; producers: Drew Diamond/Matthew Smagnik/Jenna Cavelle; Gravitas Ventures; 2019)
“It’s a sharp-eyed character-driven film, whose characters are both lovable and absurd, which makes for an unusual film.”
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
First time feature film director and former actor, Kelly Blatz, is auteur of this quirky romantic drama filmed documentary style. It’s inspired by a true story, and is adapted from the photography book by Isadora Kosofsky. It has been richly documented in a photo series in Time Magazine by the renown documentary photographer Isadora Kosofsky.
William Selig (Tom Bowers, long-time character actor) is an unstable 84-year-old intelligent and charming but delusional WWII veteran, convinced anyone against him is a Nazi. After falling in love with two senior citizens, Adina (Anne Gee Byrd) and Jeanie (Marlyn Mason), his life mission becomes to save his ladies from being wasted in their different retirement homes in East Hollywood.
Selig sleeps with Adina in the same retirement home where they both reside. When caught, he gets booted from the home. But before you can say Jackie Robinson, he finds another East Hollywood home and shacks up with the resident Jeanie (Marlyn Mason). The ladies are opposites, Adina, age 90, was born with a silver spoon in her mouth and is a published poetess, while Jeanie, age 81, is an emotional woman who sometimes gets so frustrated she forgets where she is. Selig is attracted to both and vows to save both from what he sees as an imprisonment in their retirement homes. The ladies at first oppose this free-love sharing arrangement, but then grudgingly accept it.
The slight story is built around how funny you find it. As when wacky, I’m right on it. As far as it being funny, it’s up to your individual taste (as is all comedy). But this film is not for everyone. It seems to be for those looking for a comedy to push back against the accepted society morality values for the elderly.
The ladies are both independent-minded and can deal without being jealous of each other. But both want their own man, not someone having his way with both.
How things work themselves out, forms the gist of the oddball story.
REVIEWED ON 8/2/2020 GRADE: B