Blaironit Excellent film with a gripping story!

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

Mehdi Hoffman There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Isbel A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

atlasmb Stories about writers who are having difficulty putting pen to paper are a dime a dozen, but I found this one charming. Hugh Grant plays the fallow screenwriter who follows the adage, "Those who can't...teach." His life is a total failure on all fronts, but he manages to survive thanks to a droll wit and his refusal to lay down and die.Marisa Tomei plays the object of his distracted attention with her usual aplomb. Without committing to anything, she becomes the rudder to his floundering ship, with insight and a tender recognition for his hidden value. But it is Grant who makes this film something special, imbuing every scene with an honesty that makes the story enjoyable. Here he is not so glib as he is dealing with the trials of every moment.This is a sleeper I must recommend.

cmcastl Yes, I liked it. More than I thought I would; much more. I am not the hugest fan of Hugh Grant, but this film played well to both his strengths and weaknesses as an actor and, well, to the background of his life, shall we say. I salute his ability to accept his strengths and weaknesses in accepting the part. The film suggested that, apart from the louche aspects of English writer Keith Michael's life, the part he plays, the chap has a heart and deserves redemption. He just needed the right girl to awaken it and also to awaken his inspiration. He deserved that filip both as character and person. Marisa Tomei was never lovelier than in her girl-next-door role. It is a pity we haven't seen more of her on screen in the meantime. So Hollywood but I love it! There is this dismissive attitude to feel-good movies, as they are called. But I love 'em. Those that succeed,as this does, have this pleasant, positive and life- affirming aura about them. Hollywood's greatest invention, along with the Western. Shakespeare's King Lear is for manic-depressives!In this film, miracles can happen in middle America, that great space in middle of the country that the elites of both sides of the country fly over without caring about it much. But this is the engine of the American economy and the American soul. And writing this review at this time, there are additional political resonances here, are there not?This is a light but philosophical comedy and there is nothing wrong with that, I say. But, to its credit, it does suggest the harsher, harder side of Hollywood. The film didn't have to lay it on the line but I liked that it suggested. at least, the more abrasive quality of reality, particularly the reality of a Hollywood writer who fears he may be past his best. But also, as I said, that the American dream prevails, in the artistic imagination if not always in real life, is an important proposition of the genre. And I say that as someone not American but someone who speaks with Hugh Grant's accent if, enviously, not being quite as good looking as him!Film, or movies, if you prefer, is still the vibrant artistic genre of our time. Modern Western music, architecture, sculpture and painting, seem to be in decline. We needs must take our comfort where we may.Two hours emphatically not wasted.And not to forget Alison Janney, the adversarial mid-West professor, I love her from The West Wing. Pity we haven't seen more of her on- screen in the meantime.

TxMike Hugh Grant is aging gracefully, now in his early 50s and a bit more stocky and starting to look like Pierce Brosnan. Here he is Keith Michaels who some years earlier had written the screen play for a movie that was very popular. When he meets new people they often say "That is my favorite movie of all time." But Keith has not had a script idea accepted in some time and needs work. His agent suggests he take the job for one semester as writing teacher at a college in New York.So he flies from sunny and warm California to snowy and cold New York with a paid rental house and car. He decides he will do the minimum, collect his salary, and come up with his next script ideas. Students submit script ideas to be selected into his class, instead of actually reading the scripts he uses their social media profiles to select them. He gets an interesting mix including several very pretty girls. But he goes way too far when he tells the students, 5 minutes into the first class, write the rest of your script, it will take about 30 days, so our next class is in a month. Plus the quick affair with one of his pretty students doesn't help.The college has standards and they are enforced by Allison Janney as professor Mary Weldon who also is the head of the ethics committee. His task is made even more difficult when he insults her favorite author during a faculty social. So eventually to keep from getting fired he has to convince her that he made a couple of honest mistakes and that he really is making a positive difference in the lives of his students.One of his students is Marisa Tomei as Holly Carpenter, a single mother who also works at a number of different jobs when she is not in class. She and Keith strike up a friendship through all this and as the move ends it is not clear but we sense they may be getting together after all the dust settles.Also good is J.K. Simmons as Dr. Lerner, the head of the department Keith is in. He has a way of putting events into a realistic perspective and tells Keith, if that were my 18-yr-old daughter in college and you did that, I'd be after you and I'd probably kill you.All in all a bit better movie than I expected it to be.

MacCarmel Marc Lawrence has written another mediocre rom-com. This one has the added special sauce of overt sexism added to its dull, predictable script. Hugh Grant turns in another lifeless Hugh Grant performance. Allison Janney's comedic talents are wasted in the role of the stereotyped humorless, angry woman who teaches college level female-centric literature. J.K. Simmons makes the most of his supporting role. And Marisa Tomei is the only clear grown up in the room. Of course the male lead would be attracted to a smart, fun, caring, capable woman who challenges him to be better. The bigger question is why in the world would she ever be interested in Grant's sad sack, has-been, rude, condescending and patronizing leading man?I think the ugh factor was telling from the beginning when the washed up writer takes a teaching job he doesn't want but a) instead of reading the students' writing samples he uses social media profiles to fill the class with hot girls and two not hot nerdy guys, and b) in a class filled with females of course it's one of the guys who the teacher chooses to promote to his agent and to sell a script. Because, you know......the girls aren't there for the writing. The film continued it's downward slide from there.