Grade: B
The Good: Charming and consistent in delivering heartwarming humor. Hanks and Roberts deliver as only Academy Award winners could.
The Bad: Crowded cast leads to some underserved performances from great actors. Clearly designed as older-skewing counterprogramming.
The Ugly: Hanks in tightie whiteys. Nuff’ said.
Full disclosure: I’m not a big Tom Hanks fan. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with his acting or even his films. They’ve just never really captured my attention. If I had to venture a guess, it’s because most of Tom Hanks performances occur in classically styled movies that hearken back to a more innocent era of filmmaking and storytelling that runs counter to the edgier cinema I grew up with.
That said, I was genuinely charmed and entertained by Hanks’ Larry Crowne, a cute comic tale of one man’s journey through his first semester of college after his life is turned beyond upside down. Crowne, directed by and starring Hanks, follows former retail specialist the eponymous Larry Crowne as he navigates his first semester of college in the wake of being fired from big box retailer, UMart (a fictional, but still unholy, merging of Target and Wal-Mart). In his first semester, Crowne, who went from high school to the navy to retail work, encounters bubbly free spirit Talia (Gugu Mbatha-Raw of NBC’s Undercover fame), eccentric Econ maestro Dr. Matsutani (George Takei, clearly enjoying himself way too much), and disenchanted speech professor Mercy Tainot (Julia Roberts, delivering wonderful energy and range), who just might change Crowne’s life, or vice versa.
Crowne opens with some solid, if not entirely original, observations on life in recession-afflicted America. When audiences first meet Larry, he is the master of his domain. He is fully invested in his, admittedly unglamorous, job. He drives a gas-guzzling SUV and lives in cozy rancher that he probably shouldn’t be able to afford on a TargetMart salary. Larry’s unceremonious firing—for what has to be the most contrived reason possible (lacking a college education is reason enough to fire a long term employee in retail, really?)—and some nudging from his wacky next door neighbor, yard sale entrepreneur Lamar (Cedric the Entertainer), leads him to enroll in his local community college, trade his SUV in for a hip fuel-efficient scooter and start rocking vintage threads. The problem with most of these changes is that they are all thrust upon Larry rather than being the result of active personal growth. The fact that Larry is a bit of a passive lead doesn’t cripple the story, but it does keep him from truly owning his growth.
Every person or class Crowne encounters challenges him to rethink his life, but none more so than Julia Roberts’ Mercy Tainot, who is facing her own life crisis with a middling career and a lazy husband (Bryan Cranston) who would rather surf for porn than work. Roberts doesn’t bring her trademark high energy to the proceedings until the midpoint, but her evocation of Tainot’s crushing ennui in the early goings is pretty spot-on. Anybody’s who’s been generally fed up with where life has taken you will find a lot of common ground with the early stages of Roberts’ performance. Interestingly, Roberts spends most of the movie dealing with her circumstance in relative isolation. Sure, any viewer with a passing familiarity of popular cinema knows how her story will end, but allowing her character, and Hanks’, to grow without sharing every scene helps to dial back some of the typical rom-com tropes that sneak into better films.
By avoiding some clichés of modern dramedies, Hanks, directing his second feature since 1996’s That Thing You Do, focuses intently on a charming cast of slightly off-kilter characters. Gugu Mbatha-Raw’s is the breakout here, playing the manic pixie dream girl the way it should be played, as the agent of change rather than the object of affection. Here infectious positivity and freewheeling attitude recall that of a young Julia Roberts, whose early subtle antagonism with the character could double as commentary on the way older actresses view their “replacements”. Mbatha-Raw is only one of a star-studded cast that is so packed with talent that many are criminally under- or misused, especially Bryan Cranston and Taraji P. Henson. However, the sheer abundance talent in front of and behind the camera—including My Big Fat Greek Wedding’s Nia Vardalos as co-writer along with Hanks—ensures that Crowne is no amateur night. It may not be riotous, but it is consistently funny, due in no small measure to performances that focus on character-based humor rather than sight gags or cheap shots.
Some more full disclosure: I’m probably outside of the target demo for Larry Crowne, but as adjunct at my local community college, I was intrigued to see a big screen take on the institution. Between this and Community, it’s almost as if community college is becoming a thing. Almost.
Regardless of content and target demos, Larry Crowne is the definition of a feel-good movie going experience. It’s not particularly edgy or challenging, but the great character work and consistency of good-natured humor should hit the sweet spot in the hearts of audiences of all ages. Sadly, Crowne is clearly being setup as counterprogramming to some movie about robotic cars, or some such nonsense, but that doesn’t mean it deserves to be overlooked. Take a cue from Larry Crowne himself and do the opposite of what is expected of most moviegoers this holiday weekend by giving this flick a chance.
The Good: Charming and consistent in delivering heartwarming humor. Hanks and Roberts deliver as only Academy Award winners could.
The Bad: Crowded cast leads to some underserved performances from great actors. Clearly designed as older-skewing counterprogramming.
The Ugly: Hanks in tightie whiteys. Nuff’ said.
Full disclosure: I’m not a big Tom Hanks fan. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with his acting or even his films. They’ve just never really captured my attention. If I had to venture a guess, it’s because most of Tom Hanks performances occur in classically styled movies that hearken back to a more innocent era of filmmaking and storytelling that runs counter to the edgier cinema I grew up with.
That said, I was genuinely charmed and entertained by Hanks’ Larry Crowne, a cute comic tale of one man’s journey through his first semester of college after his life is turned beyond upside down. Crowne, directed by and starring Hanks, follows former retail specialist the eponymous Larry Crowne as he navigates his first semester of college in the wake of being fired from big box retailer, UMart (a fictional, but still unholy, merging of Target and Wal-Mart). In his first semester, Crowne, who went from high school to the navy to retail work, encounters bubbly free spirit Talia (Gugu Mbatha-Raw of NBC’s Undercover fame), eccentric Econ maestro Dr. Matsutani (George Takei, clearly enjoying himself way too much), and disenchanted speech professor Mercy Tainot (Julia Roberts, delivering wonderful energy and range), who just might change Crowne’s life, or vice versa.
Crowne opens with some solid, if not entirely original, observations on life in recession-afflicted America. When audiences first meet Larry, he is the master of his domain. He is fully invested in his, admittedly unglamorous, job. He drives a gas-guzzling SUV and lives in cozy rancher that he probably shouldn’t be able to afford on a TargetMart salary. Larry’s unceremonious firing—for what has to be the most contrived reason possible (lacking a college education is reason enough to fire a long term employee in retail, really?)—and some nudging from his wacky next door neighbor, yard sale entrepreneur Lamar (Cedric the Entertainer), leads him to enroll in his local community college, trade his SUV in for a hip fuel-efficient scooter and start rocking vintage threads. The problem with most of these changes is that they are all thrust upon Larry rather than being the result of active personal growth. The fact that Larry is a bit of a passive lead doesn’t cripple the story, but it does keep him from truly owning his growth.
Every person or class Crowne encounters challenges him to rethink his life, but none more so than Julia Roberts’ Mercy Tainot, who is facing her own life crisis with a middling career and a lazy husband (Bryan Cranston) who would rather surf for porn than work. Roberts doesn’t bring her trademark high energy to the proceedings until the midpoint, but her evocation of Tainot’s crushing ennui in the early goings is pretty spot-on. Anybody’s who’s been generally fed up with where life has taken you will find a lot of common ground with the early stages of Roberts’ performance. Interestingly, Roberts spends most of the movie dealing with her circumstance in relative isolation. Sure, any viewer with a passing familiarity of popular cinema knows how her story will end, but allowing her character, and Hanks’, to grow without sharing every scene helps to dial back some of the typical rom-com tropes that sneak into better films.
By avoiding some clichés of modern dramedies, Hanks, directing his second feature since 1996’s That Thing You Do, focuses intently on a charming cast of slightly off-kilter characters. Gugu Mbatha-Raw’s is the breakout here, playing the manic pixie dream girl the way it should be played, as the agent of change rather than the object of affection. Here infectious positivity and freewheeling attitude recall that of a young Julia Roberts, whose early subtle antagonism with the character could double as commentary on the way older actresses view their “replacements”. Mbatha-Raw is only one of a star-studded cast that is so packed with talent that many are criminally under- or misused, especially Bryan Cranston and Taraji P. Henson. However, the sheer abundance talent in front of and behind the camera—including My Big Fat Greek Wedding’s Nia Vardalos as co-writer along with Hanks—ensures that Crowne is no amateur night. It may not be riotous, but it is consistently funny, due in no small measure to performances that focus on character-based humor rather than sight gags or cheap shots.
Some more full disclosure: I’m probably outside of the target demo for Larry Crowne, but as adjunct at my local community college, I was intrigued to see a big screen take on the institution. Between this and Community, it’s almost as if community college is becoming a thing. Almost.
Regardless of content and target demos, Larry Crowne is the definition of a feel-good movie going experience. It’s not particularly edgy or challenging, but the great character work and consistency of good-natured humor should hit the sweet spot in the hearts of audiences of all ages. Sadly, Crowne is clearly being setup as counterprogramming to some movie about robotic cars, or some such nonsense, but that doesn’t mean it deserves to be overlooked. Take a cue from Larry Crowne himself and do the opposite of what is expected of most moviegoers this holiday weekend by giving this flick a chance.
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