This quirky comedy drama opens with Jesse, a college
admissions officer living in New York City, traveling back to his liberal arts
college in Ohio to attend his old professor's retirement ceremony. There he
meets Zibby, a student attending the college, and they quickly form a strong
friendship. Once he returns to New York, Jesse stays in contact with Zibby
through exchanging letters with her. Zibby asks him to return to Ohio so she
can see him, but upon arriving is apprehensive about continuing a relationship
with Zibby who is 16 years younger than him. The two must help each other
figure out the complexities surrounding their wide age gap and the feelings
that they have for each other.
To put it simply, this movie was certainly odd. From
"the hat guy" (you'll know exactly what I'm talking about if you
watch Liberal Arts) to the awkward chemistry between Jesse and
Zibby, I found this film to be somewhat uncomfortable to watch. Sure, there
were some elements that did work and buried among all the awkwardness were
several truly funny moments. But overall, I was pretty disappointed with Liberal
Arts.
To begin, I thought the movie was slow to evolve and get to
its point. The plot itself is pretty sparse; a guy travels to his college town
and falls for a girl much younger than he is. That's pretty much it. I feel
that to compensate, Liberal Arts just throws a bunch of
unrelated stuff into the mix that just doesn't seem to mesh with the main
storyline. This movie also bounced around between comedy and drama, never quite
establishing what it is suppose to be. A last negative point I want to make
about Liberal Arts is just how disjointed the characters
all seem from each other. While I was watching the film none of the people in
it seemed to really connect to the other actors. It's hard to explain, but the
best way I can describe it is that the actors didn't seem authentic. There was
an emptiness behind their words and actions in this movie.
As I said above, there are a few positive elements. Not
only are there several comedic scenes that were pulled off pretty well, there
were also some heartwarming moments. Ultimately, for me Liberal Arts was
like a blank, dull canvas with a very unsubstantial plot punctuated by brief
yet vivid moments that were done well. I certainly didn't love this movie, and
found myself to be bored and sometimes a bit bemused by parts in it, but I also
didn't hate it. Overall, Liberal Arts is not a movie that I
would go out of my way to advocate watching, but if you are so inclined you may
find it to be more enjoyable than I did.
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Drama/Comedy
Run Time: 97 minutes
Release Date: September 14, 2012
My Rating: ★★☆☆☆
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