Most of Martin Scorsese’s After Hours is set in SoHo, a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan.
The 1985 black comedy follows Paul Hackett, played by Griffin Dunne, during an increasingly strange night after he travels from his office to downtown Manhattan. The film uses SoHo’s loft buildings, streets, and nighttime atmosphere as a maze-like setting for Paul’s misadventures.
Joseph Minion wrote the screenplay, and the story’s escalating misunderstandings turn an ordinary trip into a surreal urban odyssey. Although the film moves through several locations, its central action remains associated with the SoHo area and its converted industrial lofts.
After Hours is sometimes grouped with Scorsese’s crime films, but its tone is closer to dark comedy and urban farce. The film also marked an important change of pace after his more serious historical and religious projects of the early 1980s.