Elizabethtown **** (2005, Orlando Bloom, Kirsten Dunst, Susan Sarandon, Alec Baldwin, Paul Schneider, Jessica Biel, Judy Greer) – Classic Movie Review 611

Writer-director Cameron Crowe’s 2005 film is another warm-hearted, deliciously quirky treat from the maker of Jerry Maguire.

Orlando Bloom stars as a shoe designer called Drew Baylor, who decides to commit suicide after being responsible for a loss of almost $1,000million in his company. At that same moment, he gets a phone call from his sister Heather (Judy Greer) telling him that his beloved Southern patriarch father has just died in Elizabethtown, Kentucky.

She tells him he should bring the father’s body back home since his mother Hollie (a tap-dancing Susan Sarandon) is having problems with relatives. But, when Drew travels to Elizabethtown on an empty red eye plane, he meets the flight attendant Claire Colburn (played by Kirsten Dunst).

During an outrageous memorial to the father, an unexpected romance blooms between Dunst’s Claire and Bloom’s Drew, and she changes his whole doomy view and suicidal perspective on life.

The performances are extremely sweet and appealing in this adorable mix of drama, romance and comedy. It’s a bit of a stretch to imagine Bloom as American, much more as Sarandon’s son, but somehow they make it work anyway, through sheer force of personality and charisma.

Alec Baldwin, Paul Schneider, Bruce McGill, Loudon Wainwright III, Gailard Sartain and Jessica Biel are also in the classy cast.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 611

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