I reviewed this on Letterboxd – here’s more.

The fawning over Catcher in the Rye baffles me – in real life and in this film. Why so many high school students were forced to read this piece of toxic masculinity is a question I can only answer by pointing to the current and past state of our education system and really our entire patriarchal culture. Franny and Zooey is to fawn over. Holden Caulfield was a disgusting asshole. Period.

The movie had dulled tones of the Devil Wears Prada. But there was something about the main character’s job that I would have loved, so I stuck with it. She works for a literary agency, even though she fancies herself a writer, and at the agency she reads mail sent to J.D. Salinger – who was referred to repeatedly as a recluse. Her boss, played by Sigourney Weaver, modeled after Amanda Priestly from Devil Wears… represents Salinger and she’s as quirky and offsetting as Salinger himself.

There’s lots of dumb jokes about technology, lots of fans who can not say enough good things about Catcher in the… and a main character who in fact has never read Salinger. What school did she go to? It’s 1995 and there’s an adult living in the U.S. who was not forced to read that book of crap?

I wasn’t bored. I was a bit sucked in. But it was a pretty MEH sort of film.

One positive note, and almost a reason to watch this film is that Seána Kerslake is in it – not enough screen time for her though. She’s also in a truly amazing film, A Date for Mad Mary. Watch that instead.