• fax: 1-866-743-3439
  • toll-free: 1-877-366-7327

Blog by Don Kennedy

<< back to article list

Admission

Admission gets us into the life of Portia Nathan (Tina Fey), a workaholic admissions officer at prestigious Princeton University which like all Ivy League schools has a plethora of applicants of which only a few are granted access. She’s delusional about being  happy with Mark (Michael Sheen) her rumpled, scholarly, patronizing and distant significant other but the only believable relationships she has are with her bonsai tree and backstabbing office rival Corrine (Gloria Reuben). Wouldn’t you know Portia and Corrine are both up for the job held by Clarence (Wallace Shaw) their retiring boss. Portia’s job includes a yearly road trip to feeder schools which takes her to a rural, off beat, eco friendly institution coincidentally run by John Pressman (Paul Rudd) one of Portia’s college classmates. While perusing Portia romantically (with little discernable passion) he also trumpets his pet charge Jeremiah (Nat Wolff) as a must have student at Princeton. Although swayed, Portia can not rectify Jeremiah’s grades and extra curriculars both of which are epic fails. She becomes a convert however when John proves there is a long ago link between Portia and Jeremiah. Oh yeah and wouldn’t you know Johns quirky school is just down the road from the equally quirky Susannah (Lily Tomlin) Portia’s academic but distant and critical mother. Tina Fey and Paul Rudd are two of today’s most adored actors and you expect to enjoy their on screen work but charisma only goes so far when delivering light weight material. Too bad because the 2009 Jean Hanff Kprelitz novel that this picture is based on has been very well receive. Maybe that’s because the book wasn’t written for laughs but for this screenplay it has been twisted into a romantic comedy – yet still without a lot of laugh.

Archives