Review: Larry Crowne, Which Was Pretty Terrible

Full review available here.

So, Larry Crowne. Not just starring Tom Hanks, but directed and cowritten by Tom Hanks. And I pretty well hated it! How do you hate a Tom Hanks movie? I found a way.

It mostly comes down to two things: Larry Crowne is a mess, and its sensibility is very, very stupid, filled with quirky, fun! people and Manic Pixie Dream Girls ordered straight off the MPDG rack. I’m gonna go ahead and blame a lot of that on cowriter Nia Vardalos. Why? Because I can. It seems like her style. You can’t prove it’s not her fault!

But back to the mess. Is this the story of a man going through a mid-life crisis? An inspiring school drama? Or a romantic dramedy whose greatness is on full display when Julia Roberts’ porn-obsessed sketch of a husband bellows about “huge knockers”?

Larry Crowne is all of these things. Larry Crowne is none of these things. This might sum it up best: Tom Hanks’ titular character says “Speck-tack-ah-lur!” on several occasions. Why? What is this supposed to say about Larry Crowne? Is it supposed to say anything at all? Is it supposed to be funny?

I have no damn clue. Somewhere in there is a much better movie. But you’d have to strip out the drapes, the carpet, and most of the furniture to get there–they’re tacky, confused, and awfully hard to look at.