My review was written in December 1992 after watching the movie on video cassette.
Sandahl Bergman shines in the winning romantic comedy "Loving Lulu", a sexually liberated version of the entertaining trifles Hollywood routinely cranked out during its golden age. Presented at the recent MIFED market, the feature has good potential in both cable and broadcast TV use.
With thrillers and action genre films dominant for U.s indie producers, the durable romantic comedy format is still plied by Europens, notably French-American co-productions from Chrysalide and the Movie Group that take Yank talent to Paris. "Loving Lulu" is an all-American effort, backed by German funding.
Bergman toplines as the wife of psychiatrist Charley Hayward: she falls in love with one of his patients, gag-writer Charles Grant. The crux of Linda Ferrero's ingenious screenplay is letting the audience in on hubby Hayward's gaffe: he keeps advising Grant to have an affair with "that married woman" the patient talks about.
The script's cleverest gimmick is Hayward's weekly parties for his patients, to which everyone must wear a paper bag over his or her head. Twists and turns of the Bergman/Grant romance are effective, though helmer Howard Wexler resolves matters with a low-impact happy ending.
Bergman proves that sex appeal has no age limit and develops considerable sympathy for her character.
Grant is no Cary Grant but is nevertheless appealing as the hero and Hayward is a good comic foil. Slapstick is provided by Evan Kim as a burglar who preys on the cast, with girlfriend (Elyse Dinh) as accomplice.
