''The Leisure Seeker'' is a 2017

comedy-drama Comedy drama, also known by the portmanteau ''dramedy'', is a genre of dramatic works that combines elements of comedy and drama. The modern, scripted-television examples tend to have more humorous bits than simple comic relief seen in a typical ...

film directed by

Paolo Virzì Paolo Virzì (; born 4 March 1964) is an Italian film director, writer and producer. Early life and work Virzì was born in Livorno, Italy in 1964, as the son of a Sicilian police officer in the Carabinieri and a former singer. After spending ...

, in his first full English-language feature. The film is based on the 2009 novel of the same name by Michael Zadoorian. It stars

Helen Mirren Dame Helen Mirren (born Helen Lydia Mironoff; born 26 July 1945) is an English actor. The recipient of numerous accolades, she is the only performer to have achieved the Triple Crown of Acting in both the United States and the United Kingdom ...

and

Donald Sutherland Donald McNichol Sutherland (born 17 July 1935) is a Canadian actor whose film career spans over six decades. He has been nominated for nine Golden Globe Awards, winning two for his performances in the television films '' Citizen X'' (1995) a ...

, acting together for the first time since the 1990 film '' Bethune: The Making of a Hero''. It was screened in the main competition section of the 74th Venice International Film Festival. Mirren received a

Golden Globe The Golden Globe Awards are accolades bestowed by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association beginning in January 1944, recognizing excellence in both American and international film and television. Beginning in 2022, there are 105 members of ...

nomination for her work in the film.

Cast

as John Spencer *

as Ella Spencer *

Christian McKay Christian Stuart McKay (born 30 December 1973) is an English stage and screen actor. He is perhaps best known for his portrayal of Orson Welles in the 2008 film '' Me and Orson Welles'', for which he was nominated for over two dozen awards includ ...

as Will Spencer *

Janel Moloney Janel Moloney is an American actress. She is best known for her role as Donna Moss on the television series ''The West Wing'', a role for which she received nominations for Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series ...

as Jane Spencer *

Dana Ivey Dana Robins Ivey (born August 12, 1941) is an American actress. She is a five-time Tony Award nominee for her work on Broadway, and won the 1997 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play for her work in both ''Sex and Longin ...

as Lillian *

Dick Gregory Richard Claxton Gregory (October 12, 1932 – August 19, 2017) was an American comedian, civil rights leader, business owner and entrepreneur, and vegetarian activist. His writings were best sellers. Gregory became popular among the Afric ...

as Dan Coleman * Kirsty Mitchell as Jennifer Ward *

Robert Pralgo Robert Pralgo (born June 4, 1966) is an American actor. Pralgo was born in the Bronx in New York City. He graduated with a "BA Television and Film Production" at the University of Georgia in 1989. After graduation, he worked as a bartender while ...

as Phillip * Mylie Stone as Emily Ward

Production

Development

The film reunited director

with producers Fabrizio Donvito, Benedetto Habib, and Marco Cohen from the Indiana Production Company, since their collaboration in ''

Human Capital Human capital is a concept used by social scientists to designate personal attributes considered useful in the production process. It encompasses employee knowledge, skills, know-how, good health, and education. Human capital has a substantial ...

'' and ''

Like Crazy ''Like Crazy'' is a 2011 American romantic drama film directed by Drake Doremus and starring Anton Yelchin, Felicity Jones, and Jennifer Lawrence. Written by Doremus and Ben York Jones, the film tells the story of Anna (Felicity Jones), a Brit ...

'' which also won many festival awards. It is also the director's first film shot solely in English. Sutherland and Mirren had previously collaborated as a married couple in the Phillip Borsos directed China-set saga, '' Bethune: The Making of a Hero'', and this is their first film together for 27 years.

Filming

Principal photography for the film began in July 2016 in Atlanta, where the crew's cars were damaged on set by flooding. A casting call for extras was sent out, and filming also took place in Stone Mountain and Dunwoody, Georgia. Other important scenes included Jekyll Island, Georgia, US 1 in Key West and the Hemingway House in

Key West, Florida Key West ( es, Cayo Hueso) is an island in the Straits of Florida, within the U.S. state of Florida. Together with all or parts of the separate islands of Sigsbee Park, Dredgers Key, Fleming Key, Sunset Key, and the northern part of Stock Isla ...

. Fisherman's Hospital is located in

Marathon, Florida Marathon is a city spread over Knight's Key, Boot Key, Key Vaca, Fat Deer Key, Long Point Key, Crawl Key and Grassy Key islands in the middle of the Florida Keys, in Monroe County, Florida, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a ...

Release

The film, based on

the novel ''The Novel'' (1991) is a novel written by American author James A. Michener. A departure from Michener's better known historical fiction, ''The Novel'' is told from the viewpoints of four different characters involved in the life and work of ...

by Michael Zadoorian, was sold at Cannes by BAC Films. On August 30, 2017,

Focus Features Focus Features LLC is an American film production and distribution company, owned by Comcast as part of Universal Pictures, a division of its wholly owned subsidiary NBCUniversal. Focus Features distributes independent and foreign films in the U ...

acquired the UK rights to the film. It was released on March 9, 2018.

Reception

Box office

''The Leisure Seeker'' grossed $3.2 million in the United States and Canada, and $14.6 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $17.8 million.

Critical reception

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

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 Wan ...

, the film holds an approval rating of 38% based on 109 reviews, and an average rating of 5.2/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "''The Leisure Seeker'' certainly doesn't suffer from any shortage of acting talent, but it's largely squandered on a predictable, diffuse drama with little to say." 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 has a weighted average score of 45 out of 100, based on 23 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

References

External links

* * *
For Better or Worse: A Gendered Outlook of the films The Leisure Seeker and Alaska
{{DEFAULTSORT:Leisure Seeker, The 2017 films 2010s English-language films English-language French films English-language Italian films Films directed by Paolo Virzì Films shot in Atlanta Films shot in Florida 2010s road comedy-drama films Films based on American novels Italian road comedy-drama films Films about old age Films about Alzheimer's disease 2017 comedy films 2017 drama films French road comedy-drama films 2010s French films