The Lifeguard (2013) 7/10

Starring : Kristen Bell, Mamie Gummer, Martin Starr, David Lambert, Amy Madigan
Director : Liz W Garcia
Running Time : 98 mins

Suffering from a bout of depression, New York reporter Leigh London (Bell) decides to move back to her home town in Connecticut and takes a job working for minimum wage as a lifeguard. She gets back in touch with her childhood friends Mel (Gummer) and Todd (Starr), but this lapse into her childhood ways leads her to start a relationship with Little Jason (Lambert), a troubled sixteen year-old.

This movie really skates over the whole statutory rape theme of this movie and focuses on the theme of Leigh trying to find meaning in her life. Granted, the age of consent in Connecticut is sixteen (apparently it’s so kids can be enlisted at that age), but that doesn’t make what Bell’s character did any more right. There will be those who focus heavily on this issue, but if you look at this movie in a way that it is simply about Leigh having what amounts to a mid-life crisis and trying to cope with it then this isn’t that bad a film, and the soundtrack is great!

You’ll like this if you liked : Garden State