Taglines: They found each other just in time.
Long Weekend Movie Storyline. Bart is down on his luck after he has to take a job at a medical office and move in to the garage at the house of his best friend Doug, who is married to Rachel and has two kids. He is broke after failing to make any money off of the novel he wrote and depressed from his girlfriend Whit breaking up with him, ignoring his psychiatrist’s phone calls.
Bart goes to watch a movie and falls asleep drunk in the theater, awaking to a random girl named Vienna telling him the movie is over. They start talking and hit it off right away, going on a date at a bar and then having sex at Vienna’s motel room. Bart and Vienna soon start to connect over their mothers both having cancer, but Bart’s mom had passed years ago yet he was inspired by her to write his novel after she grew more concerned about her happiness in her last few months.
Bart confronts Vienna about her oddities and she either tries to change the subject or gives vague answers, such as she works for the government. They go to Bart’s old apartment, which is still in the process of being sold and moving in the new tenants, to discuss it in private. She reveals that she is from the future, working for a secret government branch that has discovered time travel in 2052 and using it to buy stocks that will be valuable at that time so she can cure her mom of cancer.
Bart tells Doug the next day, who advises him to eventually get her help just like how he got Bart help when he had a mental breakdown after his mom passed. Bart and Vienna grow even more attached, as they feel comfortable enough to trust each other to have mutual access to a safe deposit box containing the stocks Vienna bought for her mom.
Long Weekend is a 2021 American romantic science fiction comedy-drama film written and directed by Steve Basilone. The film stars Finn Wittrock, Zoë Chao, Damon Wayans Jr., Casey Wilson, Wendi McLendon-Covey, and Jim Rash and tells the story of a down-on-his-luck struggling writer named Bart (Wittrock) who meets Vienna (Chao), an enigmatic woman who enters his life at the just the right time.
The film was released in theaters on March 12, 2021. It was well-received by critics, who praised Wittrock and Chao’s performances as well as the film’s “unexpected twist.” Currently, the movie has grossed $528,438 in the United States.
Film Review for Long Weekend
When romantic movies are grounded in a real-world setting but contain an element of fantasy, there comes a point where you either go with it or you don’t. Think of movies such as “Starman” (1984) or “Phenomenon” (1996) or “Happy Accidents” (2000) or “Just Like Heaven” (2005), and in those cases, I was happy to come along for the journey and not get all tangled up in the science or lack thereof.
There are times — as in “Phenomenon” — when there’s ultimately a medical explanation for seemingly supernatural developments, and that may or may not be the case with the intriguing and smart and warmhearted “Long Weekend,” a nice little gem of escapist entertainment that keeps us guessing until the very end, which is corny as all get-out and maybe I even got something in my eye.
Writer-director Steve Basilone makes an impressive feature debut in this well-photographed film, which bathes Los Angeles in warm tones befitting a romantic comedy in which two people meet-cute, strike up an instant connection and are soon so lost in each other’s worlds it’s as if nobody else even exists.
Finn Wittrock (“American Horror Story”), who looks like he stepped off a 1950s Hollywood set but can play vulnerable and likable, gives one of his best performances as Bart (We don’t get too many leading men named Bart, do we?), who fell into a deep depression and had something of a breakdown after his girlfriend broke up with him. Bart is taking medication and is back out there looking for work as a writer, but he’s still in a delicate place and working on his issues, as evidenced by him downing most of a bottle of liquor in a movie theater in the middle of the day and passing out.
Bart is awakened by the only other moviegoer still in the theater: the smart and funny and pretty and slightly askew Vienna, played by the wonderful Zoë Chao, who often plays wisecracking friend roles, and it’s great to see her in the lead here and knocking it out of the park. Vienna talks Bart into going for a drink, and then more drinks, and day turns into dusk turns into night, and they share laughs and intimate glances and more laughs, and there’s even a very Movie Moment where Bart buys a couple of sparklers from some kids and Bart and Vienna join them in running about, without a care in the world.
Off we go into rom-com land! Damon Wayans Jr. and Casey Wilson are Doug and Rachel, respectively, who are married with kids but exist in this movie primarily as Supportive Best Friends for Bart. They’re happy for Bart, but isn’t it a little odd that Vienna doesn’t have a cell phone, doesn’t have a credit card, carries around a giant wad of cash and has offered only vague details about her past? Is she a criminal on the run? Someone experiencing mental health issues? An alien? A visitor from the future? From the past? From a parallel universe?
Let’s just say one of those might be true. Even after Vienna explains everything to Bart, we’re not sure what to believe, and then it’s pretty obvious what is really happening — until it’s not, and the only thing we’re sure of is Bart and Vienna are beautiful together and wouldn’t it be something if this was all real and not just a fantasy.
Long Weekend (2021)
Directed by: Steve Basilone
Starring: Finn Wittrock, Zoë Chao, Damon Wayans Jr, Casey Wilson, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Jim Rash, Carter Morgan, Amber Crews, Haley Rawson, Cyrina Fiallo, Gia Galardi, Dylan Wittrock
Screenplay by: Steve Basilone
Production Design by: Jen Dunlap
Cinematography by: Felipe Vara de Rey
Film Editing by: Libby Cuenin, Stephanie Kaznocha
Set Decoration by: Lindsey Cantrell
Music by: Lauren Culjak
MPAA Rating: R for language throughout.
Distributed by: Sony Pictures
Release Date: March 12, 2021
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