"Don't be afraid to be lonely. Loneliness teaches us what we lack — and what we don't. Loneliness is a short course in personal development," Joan Chittister has written. Writer and director Amos Kollek is an astute cartographer of this state of being. He explored it in Sue, a drama set in New York. And now, he probes the loneliness of Bella (Anna Thomson), a woman about to turn 35 who has been unlucky in love, and Paul (Robert Modica), a long-time widower who is making some tentative steps towards women.
Their meeting ground is a Manhattan coffee shop where Bella is a waitress and Paul a regular customer along with his two elderly buddies, Seymour (Vincent Argo) and Graham (Mark Margolis). Always criticized by her manipulative mother (Judith Roberts), Bella goes out on a date with Bruno (Jamie Harris), a divorced cab driver who wants to be a novelist. Unbeknownst to her, his ex-wife has dropped off her two young kids to stay with him.
Always trying to accommodate herself to others, Bella listens to Sherry-Lynn (Lonette McKee), a doctor friend who advises her on how to keep Bruno. But meanwhile, the waitress has to deal with George (Austin Pendelton), a married Broadway theatre director who has had a sexual affair with her for twelve years.
Kollek does a fine job orchestrating Paul's developing relationship with Emily (Louise Lasser), a widow who palpably yearns for love. Both Paul and Bella learn from their loneliness as they slowly open their hearts to others. In an incredibly surprising plot development, Bella is blessed beyond her wildest imagining, thanks to an act of courage and compassion she performs on the streets of the city. Fast Food, Fast Women is a comedy that satisfies with its magic moments of love, grace, and synchronicity.