The Lunch Date

This 10 minute short is nearly perfect film-making. It should be mandatory viewing in film classes everywhere.

"The Lunch Date" tells a complete and complex story, makes you feel keenly for the two central characters, has complications, twists, reversals and a wonderful resolution. It never strays from context and reality and is utterly accessible.

And it's all done with virtually no dialog.

I would love to be able to own and look at this film from time to time when I'm trying to convince myself -- against all available evidence -- that really GOOD movies can be made small and simply.

I hope that "The Lunch Date" will be made available in either DVD or video cassette very soon.

Larry Santoro Larry@LarrySantoro.com

Adam Davidson's Academy Award-winning short is about a rich woman who misses a train and then has an awkward experience in an eatery. "The Lunch Date" isn't anything profound yet manages to be thought-provoking. It forces you to ask what you would do in this situation. Don't expect the short to result in a life-changing experience. As far as I can tell, it's about making you confront your privilege and prejudices.

Worth seeing.

This film is interesting, so I recommend it.

The story is, a woman who misses the train eats lunch in a cafe. She buys salad. And she gets up from her seat to go take a fork. When she returns, there is a man eating her salad. She is puzzled. But she is so irritated that her salad is being eaten that she begins to eat it with the man. Then the man looks somewhat happy and buys coffee for two. The woman says thank you, leaves the cafe, and goes to the station. However, when the woman realizes she has forgotten something, she returns. That's where she realizes the truth.

This film has very little dialogue. But I understand the story. It's an amusing experience when you're done looking at it.

So you should see it once.

I absolutely love this film. It really points out stereotypes that we all hold. I spent considerable time trying to locate a copy of this outstanding film. I finally found it on a DVD collection entitled Cinema 16: American Short Films. It has been well worth the search and the cost. I use it in my classroom to prompt discussions about stereotypes. I have my students watch it first from the point of view of the main character, the woman who has missed her train. I have them record their thoughts and perceptions from her point of view. I stop the film as she leaves the diner to catch her train. This is when I have my students share their thoughts. I then have them finish watching the story. Are they ever surprised! After this, I have them watch it from the perspective of the man eating the salad. After sharing their thoughts from his point of view, we discuss stereotypes. My students really enjoy this outstanding short story. The message contained in this short film is incredible.

This film is a story about a woman who misses a train and has lunch to kill some time. I think the interesting point of this film is that although there is no clear explanation, we can assume the characteristics of the woman by only watching the first 30 seconds of the film. There are two points which shows the characteristics of the woman in this film. Firstly, the woman dresses up shiwily, carrying many shopping bags in her hands. We can easily assume that the woman is rich. Secondly, when the woman cannons into a man and he tries to gather the strewn items of the purse, she coldly denies his help and leaves him quickly. She does not believe people easily. She may be a very suspicious person. Since this film is only ten minutes long, there is not enough time to explain the character's characteristics in detail. This film succeeds in depicting the least information about the main character possible to describe in such limited time.