BOOK CLUB (2018)

Old age is handled funny in movies. These people have had children and grandchildren, and in this case, the generation that was all about sex during their Sexual Revolution, wind up acting like silly old folks who seem to be discovering sex, and, even though the movie is intentionally showing that they are in fact rediscovering it, they sound like 13-year-olds who've never had it at all...

In that, BOOK CLUB is not a bad film. That is, it's not completely unwatchable. It's an older persons' date flick that uses the niche of its four stars: Bergen a kind of strong lioness who is insecure deep down; Jane Fonda is basically the same thing but slightly more confident and experience up-front, and prettier now than Bergen, who looks her age the most here; Keaton's her usual quirky neurotic that Woody Allen invented for ANNIE HALL; and Mary Steenburgen is the least well-known and not an iconic actress like the others, and also, like Fonda, has aged nicely (and tap dances to rock music like MELVIN & HOWARD)...

Their men are paper mache and the book being read, Fifty Shades of Grey, is promoted in what seems like a 2-hour commercial masquerading as a rom-com.

But this propaganda fades out after the first act when the usual problems arise. Followed by a pat Hollywood ending. Either way, this is vapidly enjoyable viewing for those who aren't expecting anything actually good or solid. Let's call it, passable time-filling emptiness. Or as Woody Allen said (while married to Keaton) in LOVE AND DEATH: an empty void. MAINSTREAM GRADE CURVE: C