Deadline critic Pete Hammond has reviewed Late Fame, an independent film starring Willem Dafoe and Greta Lee that premiered at the Venice Film Festival a year ago and is only now reaching cinemas. Directed by Kent Jones and written by Oscar nominee Samy Burch, the film adapts Arthur Schnitzler's 1890s novella, relocating its setting from Vienna to New York's Soho district to explore themes of artistic rediscovery in a once-thriving creative neighbourhood now transformed.

Dafoe plays Ed Saxberger, a postal worker of 37 years who was briefly a published poet in the late 1970s before fading into obscurity. He is sought out by Meyers (Edmund Donovan), leader of a young group called the Enthusiasm Society who reject technology in favour of art, and is drawn back into a creative life he had long abandoned. Greta Lee co-stars as Gloria, an actress and singer connected to the group, who agrees to perform Saxberger's poetry at a showcase event. Hammond praises the film as a "gem" and singles out Dafoe's performance as exceptional.