Sea of Love (film)

Sea of Love
Theatrical release poster
Directed byHarold Becker
Written byRichard Price
Based onLadies' Man
by Richard Price
Produced by
Starring
CinematographyRonnie Taylor
Edited byDavid Bretherton
Music byTrevor Jones
Distributed byUniversal Pictures
Release date
  • September 15, 1989 (1989-09-15)
Running time
114 minutes[1]
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$19 million[2]
Box office$110.9 million[2][3]

Sea of Love is a 1989 American neo-noir[4] thriller film directed by Harold Becker, written by Richard Price and starring Al Pacino, Ellen Barkin and John Goodman. The story concerns a New York City detective trying to catch a serial killer who finds victims through the singles column in a newspaper.[5]

It is inspired by Price's 1978 novel Ladies' Man.[6] The film does not credit the novel Ladies’ Man as source material because the novel only shares a similar main idea, while having different characters, a different plot and a different theme. Writer Richard Price said he wanted to explore the same idea as Ladies’ Man, but make the protagonist cooler to an audience (by making him a cop and giving him a gun). The film involves the investigation of a serial killer which is completely absent from the book. Dustin Hoffman was originally in negotiations to star, before Pacino became interested in the project. It was Pacino's first film after a four-year hiatus following the critical and commercial failure of Revolution. Sea of Love was a box-office success, grossing over $110 million.

  1. ^ "Sea of Love (15)". British Board of Film Classification. September 22, 1989. Retrieved February 3, 2019.
  2. ^ a b "Sea of Love (1989)". The Numbers. Retrieved February 3, 2019.
  3. ^ "Sea of Love". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2023-07-09.
  4. ^ Silver, Alain; Ward, Elizabeth; eds. (1992). Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style (3rd ed.). Woodstock, New York: The Overlook Press. ISBN 0-87951-479-5
  5. ^ Brown, Joe (1989-11-15). "Sea of Love". Washington Post. Retrieved 2010-11-26.
  6. ^ Brown, Joe (15 September 1989). "'Sea of Love' (R)". The Washington Post. Fred Ryan. Archived from the original on 7 September 2008. Retrieved 28 January 2023.