Going into “Admission”, I had very high hopes for Tina Fey and Paul Rudd. Tina Fey ruled the small screen while writing the script and starring in “30 Rock”. I fell in love with Paul Rudd in “Clueless” and haven’t really let go of that since. Sadly, their performances fell short in their new movie.
“Admission” follows the story of Portia Newman (Fey), an uptight admissions officer at Princeton. When Princeton falls to number two in the US News and World Report list of best colleges, Portia goes off to recruit applicants. She finds herself at New Quest, an alternative school run by a former classmate of hers, the free-spirited good Samaritan John Pressman (Rudd). There, Pressman introduces her to teenage prodigy, Jeremiah, whom she becomes suspicious is her son that she gave up for adoption.
Then, Portia’s strictly normal life starts to come apart when she gets dumped by long-term boyfriend Mark (Michael Sheen) and she starts to think more and more about the baby boy that she gave up in her youth.
“Admission” was an original, interesting idea that had a lot of promise. But it could have had a much less appealing pretext and I still would have jumped at the chance to pay six dollars to see it. Because that’s how much I love Tina Fey.
The first half had me contentedly sitting in my plush chair in the theater, amused by Fey’s antics on screen and the movie’s not-so-hidden jabs at the college admission process. Then I watched the second half morph into a drama. Kind of. It seemed to teeter on the line between the two, and I was never sure about what exactly director Paul Weitz was aiming at with this movie.
Tina Fey and Paul Rudd are two of the best comedic actors working today and are incredibly likable to boot. But even they couldn’t pick up the slack left by the less-than-impressive script. The story seemed forced at some points and was seriously lacking in the comedy department. To say the love story was predictable would be an understatement, but I’m ashamed to say that I ate it all up. Because that’s just how much of a sap I am.
I wanted to like it. I really did.
It was a cute movie that would make a fine date movie, or something fun to go see one night if there’s not much to do. It just wasn’t memorable. I don’t think I’d be able to tell you very much about the plot two weeks from now. And I can still recite whole scenes from “Mean Girls”.
It had compelling characters and an interesting idea. There was a definite struggle that held on to me all the way until a pretty unsatisfactory end. I liked all the characters, but characters and good actors can’t make a good movie by themselves.
Some of the best scenes in the whole movie belong to Lily Tomlin, who plays Susannah, Portia’s tough and fiercely feminist mother. Her feistiness contrasted wonderfully with Portia’s uptightness. Tina Fey was amazing, as she always is, and Paul Rudd was just as great as ever, but it was a waste their talents.
So, what gives? I blame the script.
It was a comedy, but then it wasn’t. A weak script kept me from really getting into the story. It had a love story that surprised no one and an interesting storyline that was, unfortunately, not very well executed.
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