Synopsis
A world-weary college professor is given a life-changing diagnosis and decides to throw all pretense and conventions to the wind and live his life as boldly and freely as possible with a biting sense of humor, a reckless streak and a touch of madness.
Votre Filmothèque
Cast
- Johnny DeppRichard Brown
- Rosemarie DeWittVeronica Sinclair-Brown
- Odessa YoungOlivia Brown
- Danny HustonPeter Matthew
- Zoey DeutchClaire
- Devon TerrellDanny
- Ron LivingstonHenry Wright
- Linda EmondBarbara
- Matreya ScarrwenerRose
- Siobhan Fallon HoganDonna
- 63
Slant Magazine
The film goes down easy because it saves the self-improvement clichés for the homestretch. - 50
The Playlist
Despite a tone that oscillates between quirkish and mawkish, it’s yet another warmed-over male midlife crisis movie, given supposedly higher stakes because the middle of life will be as far as this male will get. - 50
New York Post
Zoey Deutch is fine in a non-demanding role as the requisite starry-eyed female student, and Danny Huston (“Wonder Woman”) gives us a softer side as Richard’s weepy best friend. But this is, at its core, a one-man show, and given the uncertain future of Depp’s career (being axed from the “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise, for example), it might also have been titled “Johnny Says Goodbye.” - 50
RogerEbert.com
There’s nothing wrong with a little cheese in a message about life, it’s just that with The Professor there's nothing more to it. - 40
Los Angeles Times
The movie, which comes off strangely wide-eyed about such “outré” things as marijuana and same-sex attraction, evokes some 1970s-era George Segal vehicle as it struggles to pair hip defiance with come-to-Jesus-style pathos, the latter of which provides a few of the film’s more compelling moments. - 40
The Hollywood Reporter
The picture fares better at finding occasional moments of warmth than at convincing us of its characters' reality. - 38
Movie Nation
It flirts with being offensive, but falls short. It’s not entirely maudlin, not wholly misogynistic, but close enough. - 30
Variety
From its rigid, symmetry-inclined compositions to its heavily worked one-liners, this is cautious, stifling filmmaking in thrall to a reckless, retrograde man, who does little in the course of 90 minutes to merit great fascination or pathos.