The Re-Education of Molly Singer is a mix of a couple of genres. It’s a college angst film with a story about an adult looking for direction in her life thrown in for good measure. These two genres on their own might work as funny ideas but combining them doesn’t make for that well of a film. It’s pretty bad these two genres don’t work. 

Molly Singer (Britt Richardson) is a single woman who is a lawyer. She recently graduated college but still likes to go out and party. Occasionally she brings home a random guy and sleeps with him. Finally, her wild and fast-paced life catches up with her as she doesn’t wake up in time to cover an important deposition in court of an important client. Her boss, Brenda (Jamie Pressly) has been forgiving up until now, but this is the straw that broke the camel’s back. She fires her.

This film has a major contrivance in it. There is an event that happens near the beginning of the movie that allows the story to move forward after the main character gets fired from her job. If this event didn’t happen, the film wouldn’t happen at all. It’s a blatant plot thing that a lot of comedies do but this time it’s a bit ridiculous.   This movie uses this story beat to introduce new characters and the main plot. It’s just crazy how it all happens. 

Andy Palmer, the director, tries to give the audience who are going to watch this movie an engaging character who has a mission and if she accomplishes her mission she could get her job back. It’s just so obvious what the plot is. We’ve seen this story so many times before. Many writers have used similar stories in years past. It’s a common comedy trope. Even the supporting characters are full of cliches. 

The supporting cast of characters is full of things we’ve seen before. One of them is an Asian friend who is gay, Ollie (Nico Santos). Where have we seen that before? Ty Simpkins plays Elliot the son of the Pressly character and he is a bit shy and reclusive. Plus there are a few bullies and people who want to see the Robertsons’ character fail. There is nothing new here with the cast either.

With all this story focusing on the Robertson character going back to college, there is plenty of college angst to be had. One thing the boozathon, a series of drinking games, is just one of many things that creates craziness during the entire college part of the movie. It’s fine to try and combine genres or give viewers something funny to watch, but if it’s not any good it’s not worth anyone’s time.

A technical choice Palmer, the director, and the writers used in the movie that was a strange addition was that they Carlos Alazraqui as the narrator. He tried to make the story relatable for the audience watching and add his own brand of humor to it. The problem is he just showed those watching him much more ridiculous this story truly was in the end.

The Re-Education of Molly Singer is a film that wants to be one thing and turns out to be another. It wants to be a funny angst-ridden movie with relatable elements for young women who may have been in this situation in their lives. What it ends up as is a clichéd contrived waste of my time and any other that watches it. The writing is old and most people have seen this story done in variations before. It’s nothing new. The cast is full of men and women who are nothing new in film. This movie was just not a very fun experience for me to watch and I don’t think others will like it either.

1 ½ stars

Dan Skip Allen