Synopsis
Straitlaced Princeton University admissions officer, Portia Nathan is caught off-guard when she makes a recruiting visit to an alternative high school overseen by her former college classmate, the freewheeling John Pressman. Pressman has surmised that Jeremiah, his gifted yet very unconventional student, might well be the son that Portia secretly gave up for adoption many years ago.
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Cast
- Tina FeyPortia Nathan
- Ann HaradaMrs. Lafont
- Ben LevinJunior Lafont
- Dan LevyJames
- Maggie Keenan-BolgerGirl on Tour
- Gloria ReubenCorinne
- Paul RuddJohn Pressman
- Wallace ShawnClarence
- Elaine KussackAbby
- Christopher Evan WelchBrandt
Recommendations
- 75
Entertainment Weekly
Admission, a likably breezy campus movie directed by Paul Weitz (About a Boy), is blissfully non-insulting. - 63
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
Fey plays this inner-outer conflict well. But at her most wide-eyed and vulnerable, she still has trouble making a romance credible, even with Rudd, edgy comedy’s puppy dog of a leading man. - 50
Film.com
Actions do have their consequences, though, and Weitz doesn’t try to end things too tidily for their own good. Were only that he had succeeded in committing to one of those films over the other, then Admission might have been this year’s “Liberal Arts” rather than this year’s “Smart People.” - 50
The Hollywood Reporter
Deftly playing Tina Fey's feminist-icon mother, Lily Tomlin all but steals Admission, a knowing but uneven comedy about the neuroticism of the college-admission process on both sides of the equation. - 50
Variety
The comedy feels forced as Fey works overtime to insert unnecessary zingers at the tail of every scene. If the cast weren’t so endearing, her actions could easily sour an audience on the whole experience, and Admission digs itself a hole only an ensemble this appealing can escape. - 50
Village Voice
Weitz, an openhearted director if not always a precise one, can't bring himself to whet the knives. Only Fey drills to the center of what Admission might have been—her performance has more layers of emotion than the picture does. - 40
New York Magazine (Vulture)
That first half of Admission is a lot for an actress to overcome. It’s not just very bad, it’s very fast, as if someone had overwound the metronome. Fairly naturalistic lines are delivered at the pace of screwball zingers — which stubbornly refuse to zing. - 40
Time Out
Admission’s comedy has walls built around it; director Paul Weitz (About a Boy), normally a softener of harsh edges, might have been stymied by Fey’s snappy persona.
