Late Night Shopping 2001

Sean, Luke de Woolfson, Vincent, James Lance, Jody, Kate Ashfield, and Lenny, Enzo Cilenti, work graveyard shifts in four soul-killing jobs (a hospital, a supermarket, a printed circuit board assembly factory and a call centre, respectively) and meet up in a cafe after work to kill time. Beyond these nights, each of them clings to very little of a life outside the routine. Sean hasn’t seen his girlfriend for three weeks and begins to wonder if she still lives in his apartment. Vincent is a serial womanizer. Lenny, formerly a writer of porn stories, can’t summon the courage to ask out his attractive coworker Gail. Jody, unknown to the others, has been fired from her job, but keeps showing up after her “shift” every night to talk.

At the hospital, Sean strikes up a fragile friendship with the girlfriend of a coma patient; she confides that, at the time of the accident, she was about to end the relationship. Later, the two share a risky moment and have sex on the foot of the hospital bed occupied by the comatose man.

Meanwhile, Vincent picks up an alluring young woman who turns out to be Sean’s girlfriend Madeline. Several days later Vincent’s coworker Joe has a fatal heart attack; as he’s taken to the hospital, Vincent accompanies him and runs into Sean. In a rare moment of honesty, Vincent confesses that he slept with Madeline; Sean’s initial disbelief gives way to violence. Returning to his flat, he finds that Madeline has moved out.

Sean receives an anonymous phone call and traces it to a small town where Madeline’s friend has an aunt. Sean, Lenny and Jody decide to drive there to look for Madeline. On the road they pick up Vincent, and Sean declares that they’re even after destroying Vincent’s cherished possession—a watch that once belonged to Errol Flynn.

But the search yields no Madeline, so the trio regroup in a cafe where Jody reveals she lost her job. After Vincent and Lenny head off to play crazy golf, Jody encounters Madeline and arranges a meeting between Madeline and Sean; the two of them discuss the rift in their relationship and come to the sobering conclusion that it’s over.

On the return journey, the group stops at a motorway service station. Lenny musters the nerve to ask Gail out, receives a rejection but treats it as a sign of progress. Madeline and Sean argue about who gets to keep the flat, then share a tender moment as they kiss in a photobooth.

The film closes on a small but telling shift: Gail finally manages to switch the irritating radio station, and the crew hear a newer, brighter song swell through the car speakers.