Seventy year old Ben Whittaker (Robert DeNiro) quotes Freud, who once said “love and work, work and love.” But Ben’s wife is dead. And he’s now retired. So to pass the time, he cooks, does yoga, and even studies mandarin. But he’s bored.
Jules (Anne Hathway) owns/operates a generic J Crew…her brainchild that landed her 175 employees in less than a year and a half. But she can’t keep up. And runs on Jules Standard Time and Devil-Wears-Prada cylinders. Her office has just featured an intern program which hires senior citizens.
Enter DeNiro….A former VP of a phone book sales company who doesn’t even know how to use Facebook. His colleagues have iPhones and twitter accounts, but he’s got a fountain pen and a flip phone. Immediately we know where this film is headed. Hathaway will teach DeNiro the modern world, but he may not want it, since he has a wealth of knowledge Hathaway can’t find in her size two black career khakis.
With one of those soundtracks that decide for us how we should feel, writer/director Nancy Meyers rams forced emotions in our eardrums and down our throats. This isn’t her classic Something’s Gotta Give. This ain’t even It’s Complicated. Instead, it’s complicated because it’s too neat and tidy a movie. Running on a ticking clock of cookie cutter set-up….rushed, forced, anxious to deliver some message that we could have figured out if only she’d let us relax into the film.