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Larry Crowne

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41
Metascore
 41 reviews
5.8
User Score
 105 ratings

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Director: Tom Hanks
Writer: Nia Vardalos Tom Hanks
Production: Playtone Productions
Movie Details: Until he was downsized, affable, amiable Larry Crowne was a superstar team leader at the big-box
Until he was downsized, affable, amiable Larry Crowne was a superstar team leader at the big-box company where he's worked since his time in the Navy. Underwater on his mortgage and unclear on what to do with his suddenly free days, Larry heads to his local college to start over. There he becomes part of a colorful community of outcasts, also-rans and the overlooked all trying to find a better future for themselves...often moving around town in a herd of scooters. In his public-speakingUntil he was downsized, affable, amiable Larry Crowne was a superstar team leader at the big-box company where he's worked since his time in the Navy. Underwater on his mortgage and unclear on what to do with his suddenly free days, Larry heads to his local college to start over. There he becomes part of a colorful community of outcasts, also-rans and the overlooked all trying to find a better future for themselves...often moving around town in a herd of scooters. In his public-speaking class, Larry develops an unexpected crush on his teacher Mercedes Tainot, who has lost as much passion for teaching as she has for her husband. The simple guy who has every reason to think his life has stalled will come to learn an unexpected lesson: when you think everything worth having has passed you by, you just might discover your reason to live. (Universal Pictures)

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Genre(s): Drama Comedy
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Production: Playtone Productions
Runtime: 99 min
Official Site: http://www.larrycrowne.com/#/home
Country: USA
Language: English
Director: Tom Hanks
Writer: Nia Vardalos Tom Hanks
Starring:
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Critic Reviews
(41)
41
Metascore Mixed or average reviews
10 Positive Ratings 24%
22 Mixed Ratings 53%
9 Negative Ratings 21%
Based on 41 Critic Reviews View All
75
Miami Herald
Rene Rodriguez | Jul 2, 2011
"The film seems simple and facile at a glance, but these characters and their dilemmas stay with you. These days, any of us could suddenly be Larry Crowne." ... Read full review
63
New Orleans Times-Picayune
Mike Scott | Jul 1, 2011
"Breezy but forgettable." ... Read full review
60
Empire
Helen O'Hara | Jun 27, 2011
"This one coasts by on Hanks' immense appeal and charm, but more focus and a touch more sharpness are needed to make it really come alive." ... Read full review
50
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman | Jun 30, 2011
"Inside this film, a poignant and personal story is struggling to get out. But it's couched in such awkward sentiments that it can't emerge. " ... Read full review
45
Movieline
Stephanie Zacharek | Jun 30, 2011
"In the early scenes of Larry Crowne, Hanks' Larry is so assertively regular he almost comes off as a special-needs child - grinning into his coffee-cup in the big-box-store break room, he has all the sexual allure of Forrest Gump." ... Read full review
40
Time Out
Keith Uhlich | Jun 28, 2011
"Though both lead actors are able to coast for a while on their natural charm, it's evident by the soppy finale that their "Sleepless in Seattle" and "Pretty Woman" salad days are long past." ... Read full review
20
Variety
Justin Chang | Jun 28, 2011
"Movie stars may be less valued than they used to be, but it's still puzzling to see Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts stuck in a romantic comedy as flat-footed and tone deaf as Larry Crowne. " ... Read full review
Critic Reviews
User Reviews
(40)
5.8
User Score Mixed or average reviews
36 Positive Ratings 34%
51 Mixed Ratings 48%
18 Negative Ratings 17%
Based on 105 Ratings and 40 Reviews View All
10
Waterlily
Jul 5, 2011
This was a sweet, uplifting, optimistic movie, well-cast and well-acted. It could perhaps have been a little more dynamic, but it wasThis was a sweet, uplifting, optimistic movie, well-cast and well-acted. It could perhaps have been a little more dynamic, but it was entertaining, and I could believe that Tom Hanks would get the girl :)… Expand
10
Canuck
Jan 22, 2012
My wife & I sat through this - and agreed it is one of the worst movies we have ever seen! Shame on Tom Hanks for producing such a piece of garbage.
9
ciaonine
Jul 2, 2011
I do not understand how anyone can give this movie a zero. A zero means that it has no aspects that a moviegoer would like.One goodI do not understand how anyone can give this movie a zero. A zero means that it has no aspects that a moviegoer would like.One good performance or a couple of good scenes constitute at least 3-5 points.… Expand
7
Khunter4382
Jan 16, 2012
A pleasure to watch! This film worked for me. It was light, charismatic, and fun. Watching Hanks in this role was entertaining and as you canA pleasure to watch! This film worked for me. It was light, charismatic, and fun. Watching Hanks in this role was entertaining and as you can imagine, nearly all the performances were good and sometimes even great. The film takes itself serious enough without surrendering the laughs and good times. Is it all that original? Not really, but that doesn't matter. What matters most is that this is a fun ride during each character's life changing events.… Expand
6
DarkCritic
Jul 3, 2011
Larry Crowne wasn't much too good, but a little okay for me. Tom Hanks directed this film and he can do what the actor can try somethingLarry Crowne wasn't much too good, but a little okay for me. Tom Hanks directed this film and he can do what the actor can try something better, just like the other actors doing their own direction. In this movie, it does give more credit about a nice guy whose going to college to bring back his own life to be a smart man, so he can pass this college. In the other half, it's nothing quite special because of the dialogue was pretty bland with whimsical lines that Hanks and Roberts combine into cliche, the characters are less forgettable, some other half people weren't that bad including Cedric The Entertainer, Taraji P. Henson, and George Takei are okay, and the premise of plot was average less that belongs to college students to learn about the man needs to be smart to come back for his life which it's closely to the dropout people that doesn't know anything to teach. We prefer only much interesting instead thinking about everything in college. That movie was okay for people who likes or hates it, but for me was much less good and nothing quite special. Hanks is less director that he directed, so you got a C+ on your grade.… Expand
4
Shiira
Jul 29, 2011
This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. In "Discounted Dreams", the investigative journalist, on assignment at a west coast community college, in his capacity as a monitor, observes a predominant show of indifference among the gathering students in a remedial math class towards the instructor, who is, judging by his unmodulated voice, equally disengaged, not seeming to care one bit that his lecture on the rudiments of algebra is being received as white noise. Does it bother him, the auditor wants to know, that the students in the back-row were text-messaging, and worse, sleeping through his lecture on polynomials? Unapologetically, he answers in the negative. "That's their situation," "their responsibility," claims the untrained abcedary(a transplanted biology teacher), who isn't going to lose any sleep over his 45% passing rate. The burn-out is only there to collect a paycheck. At East Valley CC, the moviegoer catches Ms.Tainot in the midst of an existential crisis. On the first day of a new semester, resignation gets an early start, as the comparative literature major wonders aloud, "Do I make a difference?" It's a rhetorical question, of course, since the jaded educator knows she doesn't, not in a profession where at this level, half the students fail to graduate, so when Mercy counts only nine bodies in the room, there's no hiding her excitement over the morning class' prospective cancellation. It's the first time she smiles. Mercedes Tainot is a bad teacher. And unbeknownst to "Larry Crowne", a bad wife, too. Since instructors at two-year campuses don't have a research component to their job description like their PhD colleagues, Mercy, unhindered by split loyalties, is really in no position to call her novelist husband lazy, when all she's expected to do is teach. The screenplay, co-written by a female, skewers perception by vilifying the blocked writer for his Internet porn addiction, a relatively harmless transgression. Looking at their failed marriage objectively, without the illiberalism of hackneyed feminism, one could adjudge the slightly boozy wife as being unsupportive. That's fine; that's the film's prerogative to paint men in such broad strokes, but what's sloppy, and sometimes unforgivable about this slight comedy is how little it knows about the inner-workings, and economic fate that befalls community colleges right now. Foregoing authenticity, Larry Crowne, a victim of downsizing(and class warfare) at a big box store, enrolls in classes without taking the placement exam that is part and parcel for all incoming students. Even worse, despite all the budget cuts that greatly affect student services and class availability, Larry gets all his first choices, as suggested by a counselor, whom you know is a Hollywood movie counselor, since in real life, most advisers are too busy to approach students in the hallway. Also, questions like: What is Larry majoring in? or, "Does he want his old job back?" go unanswered. The film can't be bothered with details. Community college serves merely as a backdrop in order for Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts to meet-cute. Like most students at these schools, the screenplay has no ambition. It settles for being a rom-com. If that's the case, a more interesting variation on the theme would have been to position Mercy as the cougar, but instead, "Larry Crowne" flits around with the oft-used trope of the older man(normally a professor) and young coed, when the pretty(old) woman mistakenly diagnoses the fast friends as a couple. "Larry Crowne" gets one thing right about community colleges: the racial diversity. As a result, the film employs colorblind casting, assigning the role of the free spirit(the Zooey Deschanel type) to an African-American. Talia is not stereotypically black; she's not a single mother on welfare, a high school dropout, paying the price for getting pregnant with every minute of her waking hours, especially when she rides the bus at night to her dead-end job across town, a grind so taxing, she can't stay awake to do homework and prepare for upcoming tests. This hypothetical black girl, however, is no stereotype. This girl is real; her obstacles, a byproduct of inner-city life. As portrayed in the PBS doc, the black girl doesn't pass remedial math and will never be a vet tech. Talia quits too; she opens up a boutique. "Larry Crowne" puts an optimistic spin on the high dropout rate, suggesting that students move on to become entrepreneurs. As for the boyfriend, by group snapping, the film coyly suggests that he's a former gangbanger by evoking "West Side Story"(the song "Cool"), when the Sharks(Puerto Rican like Dell) and Jets(working-class white like Larry) get set to rumble. Here, the snapping is used as Larry's initiation into a gang of moped riders. It's not cute, just dishonest. Like the film's notion that the students learned something in Ms. Tainot's class. All she does is sit in the back, nursing her hangover.… Expand
0
Ecclesiastes
Mar 11, 2013
Some films sacrifice realism for action, or vice versa. This endless, pointless, mindless tripe somehow manages to be both as fanciful and asSome films sacrifice realism for action, or vice versa. This endless, pointless, mindless tripe somehow manages to be both as fanciful and as boring as anything I've ever seen. If you haven't left your house or seen a film in several years, maybe you'll be able to tolerate it. I couldn't.… Expand
User Reviews