Elizabethtown

Sports trainer designer Drew (Bloom) has worked on shoe designs for 8 years but discoveres they're complete pants and worse it will cost shoe-making chief Phil (Baldwin) and his company nearly a billion to put things right. His work up the swanny and his girlfriend dumping him, Drew contemplates suicide, but is saved from such a sorry end by his sis (Greer) calling to say that Dad has died on a trip to see extended family in Kentucky. Neither sis or Mom (Sarandon) are up to getting out there and persuade Drew to fly out on their behalf and prepare the memorial arrangements. On route, Drew hits it off with air stewardess Claire (Dunst) (not surprising given he’s the only passenger on the plane) and from there a kooky romance between the two of them is born.

Elizabethtown is a bit of a mess with too many characters and writer-director Crowe not deciding when we’ve had enough individual stories needing to be told. Crowe for example tells you all about Drew’s mother's desire to tap dance even when its not that relevant, but although overburdened with ideas, fans of films like Almost Famous or Vanilla Sky, some might just appreciate the soundtrack and some decent moments as Crowe finds fun in the eccentricities of life. With echoes of Garden State, Elizabethtown is life-affirming but lacks a clarity of direction, leaving you feeling that even though director Cameron Crowe shaved off 20 mins from a version shown at festivals, he’s still not got it quite right.

Matt Arnoldi