Long Hello and Short Goodbye is a 1999 German crime film produced by Studio Hamburg Letterbox Filmproduktion and co-authored by Jeff Vintar and Martin Rauhaus. The film features a recently-released safe-cracker named Ben, and an undercover police agent named Melody. Melody's job is to dupe Ben into another job so that he can be put away once more by her sinister and ambitious boss Kahnitz. But complications arise when the talkative cop falls for the taciturn gangster.
The original American screenplay by Jeff Vintar featured a complex neo-noir flashback structure that centered around the seemingly dead characters littering the bloody floor of a fancy apartment. As the story progresses, we find out that some of these dead people are not dead at all, more are hiding in the closet, and slowly the pieces of the puzzle come together in classic film noir fashion, but with a distinctly modern edge. The producers of the German film got cold feet shortly before the movie's release, and re-edited the film as a linear story, diluting its effect and polarizing critics and audience members alike, although it remains a cult favorite among noir buffs, and received a positive review in Variety that predicted the film would play in broad-minded festivals around the world, where genre fans should lap it up.
An English-language version of Vintar's original screenplay has struggled to reach the screen for many years, under a variety of producers and production companies, making his script almost perpetually under option. One incarnation had Gustavo Mosquera (Moebius) directing, with Face/Off director John Woo and his partner Terence Chang producing under their Lion Rock banner. The screenplay is currently being developed by the production company Circle of Confusion.
Read more about Long Hello And Short Goodbye: Cast
Famous quotes containing the words long, short and/or goodbye:
“Yes, in the long run there is something to be said for these shiftless days, each distilling its drop of poison until the cup is full; there is something to be said for them because there is no escaping them.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“Our friendships hurry to short and poor conclusions, because we have made them a texture of wine and dreams, instead of the tough fibre of the human heart. The laws of friendship are austere and eternal, of one web with the laws of nature and of morals.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The colicky baby who becomes calm, the quiet infant who throws temper tantrums at two, the wild child at four who becomes serious and studious at six all seem to surprise their parents. It is difficult to let go of one’s image of a child, say goodbye to the child a parent knows, and get accustomed to this slightly new child inhabiting the known child’s body.”
—Ellen Galinsky (20th century)