An all-star cast has assembled for Book Club. Featuring Jane Fonda (Grace & Frankie), Diane Keaton (Love The Coopers), Candace Bergan and Mary Steenburgen, these four ladies are life long best friends who come together each week for their book club.
We are quickly introduced to each of them via a montage of their backstories. Carol is still happily married to Bruce (Craig T. Nelson). Sharon is divorced and a Federal Judge. Vivian is eternally single and owns a hotel with Diane a widow and mother of two grown-up daughters. All are getting on with life when Vivian decides that the next book on their reading list will be Fifty Shades Of Grey.
Spicing up their mundane routines by reading the book, the ladies start to find love with newfound confidence, all thanks to the Book Club. Each starts to rekindle romance or find new dates with the likes of Andy Garcia, Don Johnson and Richard Dreyfuss. As I said, this movie is packed full of big names.
There's a lot to like about Book Club. Firstly, it's a great story about friendship. It's a little unrealistic that they meet every month for 40 years, as most of us can't even manage a weekly FaceTime chat. However, you can get over that. The cast is excellent and the movie is pitched well for an often-overlooked demographic. The script was funny in parts but for a rom-com, it could have been sharper.
You do have to suspend belief for the duration of the film. I'm not sure a federal judge would call a recess mid-trial to take a call from her friend, or that two grown daughters would treat their very capable mother (Diane Keaton from Hampstead) like she was 140 years old. Then again, this isn't a documentary on getting older. It's just a fun and quite enjoyable rom-com. It's not groundbreaking but it is nice, if a bit forgettable.
