An Oscar-angling vanity project for John Travolta, this is
one of those glamorous portraits of would-be losers in which a run-down shack appears to have benefited from a chic interior decorator. Travolta plays a disgraced professor drinking his life away untilhis past comes back in the form of a mysterious young woman (Scarlett Johansson). The star mostly sits around quoting famous authors or playing acoustic guitar, all while a friendly
society of fringe types gather admirably around him.