Larry Crowne

Genre: Romance/Comedy| Year: 2011 | Duration: 98 mins | Director: Tom Hanks | Medium: VCD (BIG Home Video) | Trailer: HERE | My rating: 2.5*/5*

Favorite Dialogue: Mercedes: (mixing a strong frozen drink) “Mmmmm…brain freeze!”

Larry Crowne (Tom Hanks), a divorced middle-aged man and navy’s veteran cook, gets fired from his floor keeper job at a store because he lacked a college level education. Upon encouragement from his neighbor, Lamar, he enrolls at a local community college to pursue better opportunities in future, studying economics and communication. Larry befriends a bunch of young, scooter-riding young people, and strikes a special friendship with a free spirited girl Talia.  The saving grace of the movie is the subtle romance between Larry and ever-radiant Julia Roberts as Mercedes Tainot, the public-speaking professor with an alcohol addiction and a disintegrating marriage.

This tepid rom-com, which is neither full of romance nor comic is my Movie of the Day.