LIBERAL ARTS (M) (97 min)

Directed by Josh Radnor.

Starring Josh Radnor, Elizabeth Olsen, Richard Jenkins.

In which the 35-year-old Josh Radnor weighs up whether to pursue a relationship with the 19-year-old Elizabeth Olsen. He's a college graduate, back at his old school to say farewell to his (second) favourite professor. She is the daughter of the professor's friends.

Everyone behaves terribly well. Good novels are quoted and invoked, and a few decent literary jokes are cracked. There's a nice cameo from Zac Efron, and an ongoing send-up of the Twilight franchise, and it's obsession with chastity, which I think writer/director/star Radnor could have pushed a lot harder. But I laughed out loud a few times, and was never less than charmed.

Think of it as a very pleasant lit romcom for anyone who ever gave up on reading David Foster Wallace.  

- © Fairfax NZ News

Comments