Movie Reviews

Hey, here’s a movie with De Niro in which he doesn’t suck! It’s been a while since we were able to say that…

De Niro stars as Ben Whittaker, a retired widower who lives in Brooklyn and who’s kinda bored with just sitting around all day. So he applies for a position in a “Senior Intern Program” at an e-commerce company called About The Fit. At first, it doesn’t seem like he will be a good ‘fit’ among all the tech-savvy youngsters. But his old-school work ethic eventually does the trick and he even ends up working under the company’s founder, Jules (Anne Hathaway). At first Jules doesn’t like the idea of trusting Ben too much, but eventually he manages to wriggle his way in her good graces by being the stand-up guy that he is.

As it happens, Ben started working for Jules at the same time her company is in a period of transition with Jules’ investors urging her to bring in an outside CEO. She’s not exactly thrilled about the prospect, but nonetheless interviews each candidate. In the meantime, her stay-at-home husband (Anders Holm) is rooting for the idea even though he’s having an affair.

If all this sounds extremely corny, well… it’s not. The Intern is an enjoyable, funny comedy, even if a couple of scenes are somewhat cringeworthy. There is a visual gag involving the on-site masseuse that felt out of place and the caper scene in the middle of the movie is just completely wrong. Most of the time though, this movie is downright charming. De Niro is on a roll here alongside Hathaway and director Nancy Meyers completely redeems herself after the not so good The Holiday and Something’s Gotta Give.