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Year:   1999
Studio: Harpo Productions
Movie:  2/5
DVD:    0/5

Tuesdays with Morrie is a television movie based on a best-selling book. It is the story of two men. Mitch Albom (Hank Azaria) is a successful sports columnist in Detroit with a loving girlfriend and a fast-paced life. Maybe a bit too hectic because his girlfriend Janine (Wendy Moniz) is getting tired of waiting for him and he feels his life is a bit empty.

And then he finds out about Morrie Schwartz (Jack Lemmon) in a 60 Minutes special. Morrie was on of Mitch's professors in college and the one he had the closest relationship with. But since college Mitch hasn't kept in touch and now he finds out that Morrie is dying.

Mitch feels guilty so visits Morrie one last time, or so he thinks. But Morrie is if anything still vibrantly alive and cheerful. And Morrie has some things he wants to say to Mitch. Life lessons. And Mitch listens and it makes him think and he comes back each Tuesday (not trivial because Morrie lives in Boston) and they talk and do things and rekindly their friendship.

The lessons sink in and Mitch learns. He realizes that he really needs to focus on what should be the important things in life. He patches up with Janine and becomes a better person. Just in time for Morrie to die to end the movie.
Now, I'm sure the book is great but the movie was rather boring. I guess the made-for-tv production values hurt a bit. It just moves slowly and rather predictably, even if it based on a true story. At the end of the movie I didn't have any sort of "ahh, that was the point". It was more like "that was the point?" I guess I'm not the target audience.

Copyright (c) 2004 Kevin C. Wong
Page Created: October 5, 2004 Page Last Updated: October 5, 2004