My Life in Ruins

My Life in Ruins stars Nia Vardalos as Georgia, of My Big Fat Greek Wedding fame, as a Greek-American living in Greece, who reluctantly has to take a job as a tour guide after being let go from her teaching position. She's unhappy in her new job, and love life, and is the second most popular tour guide in a company that only seems to employ two of them. She's assigned a group of tourists on a multi-day bus tour populated with a bunch of exaggerated stereotypical characters. Included in this group are the gibberish speaking Australians, thick as brick Americans, hot divorcees, and the wisecracking, and wise, older gentleman, in this case played by Richard Dreyfuss. The film has some laughs here and there, but is not anywhere up to the level of Ms. Vardalos signature film. There are also no surprises here and it's obvious pretty quickly on that Georgia will get what she's looking for in the end. Mr. Dreyfuss does fine in a part he could probably do in his sleep, and Rachel Dratch of SNL fame also adds some comedic spark as well. In the end though, the film plays like a TV movie from years ago. Ms. Vardalos has a genuine screen presence but she just needed a better script than this. Time for her to try something with a little more of an edge as she definitely has the talent to play other types of roles.

Rating - 1 1/2 Stars