“Post Grad”
1 out of 5 Stars
Stars: Alexis Bledel, Michael Keaton, Carol Burnett
Director: Vicky Jenson
Rated PG-13 for sexual situations and brief strong language
Running Time: 89 minutes
“Post Grad” is mostly bad.
Unless you’re an unrepentant “Gilmore Girls” groupie, still roused by All Things Rory, there’s not much to recommend in this trite, wasteful and astonishingly regressive chick flick starring the late show’s Alexis Bledel.
She plays Ryden Malby, an idealistic recent college graduate whose great expectations get dashed by an unexpected failure to launch. The sweet, book-loving 22-year-old has a wacky interfering family, literary ambitions and an adoring hometown suitor whom she takes for granted. Thus, Ryden is barely distinguishable from Bledel’s old television character.
But because the mediocre actress’s cult appeal lies much more in her nonthreatening cuteness than in her ability to effectively emote, her shortcomings are only magnified by the scope of the big screen. Bledel’s limited talent gets further undermined next to the triumvirate of fearless comedy veterans who portray her offbeat elders: Michael Keaton as Ryden’s hapless father, Carol Burnett as her tacky grandma and Jane Lynch (best known from Christopher Guest’s improv movies) as her worried mother.
Too bad those side characters are as narrow as cardboard, written without their own motivations. They exist only to serve the struggles of the boring, self-obsessed young protagonist in Kelly Fremon’s weak script as adapted from Emily Cassel’s novel.
Live-action virgin Vicky Jenson (“Shrek,” “Shark Tale”) directs the proceedings with random subplots left dangling and without punch. The first half dwells on Ryden’s desire to land her dream job at a fancy publishing house and, failing that, to land a job of any kind. But don’t dare imagine that “Post Grad” is about to be like “The Graduate” for Generation Y, a seminal story of lost youth or quarter-life crisis that captures the frustrating recessionary zeitgeist of the late 2000s.
The Twits Who Twitter in this age of nefariousness aren’t getting their defining film here. Oh, no. Far from it.
Because before you can scream “Gloria Steinem,” this tall tale of career angst and thwarted independence suddenly turns into a retro romantic comedy from feminist hell. Ryden’s lifelong aspirations will magically resolve and then take a backseat to her desire to attend a dude. Will it be her faultless childhood BFF, the romantic musician and Ivy league law school candidate played by Zach Gilford (TV’s “Friday Night Lights”)? Or will it be the much older, smoldering Latin lover (Brazilian actor Rodrigo Santoro) with the temper?
You already know. But who cares?
