At Mittleton: Credibility Alert

Vera Farmiga and Andy Garcia aka bicycle thieves

This ridiculous film about tour-the-campus day at the fictitious Mittleton College begins in the same hackneyed way of most silly rom-coms. This time it's a squabble over a parking space. An inane tiff since it looked like plenty of spaces were available.

No matter. It was just one of countless plot devices that bury this middle-aged romantic comedy (the newest banal genre) under a sea of incredulous scenarios.

Let's back up. George and his son have come to Mittleton for a college tour. And so has Edith and her daughter. It doesn't take long for the mom and dad to ditch their offspring and set out on an adventure of self discovery.

He's an uptight cardiac surgeon. She's a free spirit who sells upscale children's furniture. In the course of their odyssey, sans kids, they steal (okay "borrow" bikes), get high on weed, lie to their kids, dance under a water fountain, and finally admit the emptiness of their lives.

The Movie Slut wonders how these two empty idiots could have lives that were otherwise.