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Tom Hanks wanted to prove his dramatic talent in the mid-1980s, and
Nothing in Common gave him a ripe opportunity. Playing an emotionally immature Chicago advertising executive, Hanks offers a prototype of his later, better role in
Big--the joking man-child with seemingly limitless reserves of energetic humor, perfectly suited to director Garry Marshall's trademark blend of featherweight comedy and sentiment. The movie wanders aimlessly before settling into its dramatic groove, involving Hanks caring for his aging, diabetic father (Jackie Gleason, well cast in his final screen role) after his mother (Eva Marie Saint) files for divorce and strikes out on her own. Like Marshall's
Pretty Woman, the movie hits several grace notes and finds unexpected depth in its characters and their need for loving connections. Meanwhile, there's cheesy nostalgia in the '80s trappings, including songs by Carly Simon and Christopher Cross, and
Once and Again TV star Sela Ward in an early supporting role.
--Jeff Shannon
Review
Nothing in Common was an attempt by Tom Hanks to add some dramatic credentials to his status as a comic lead. The first half of the film, dealing with his character's life in the advertising business, has enough comedy in it that the audience accepts Hanks more easily when the film turns melodramatic in the second half. Jackie Gleason is good as the father, but his work is occasionally undone by the maudlin scenarios he is forced to play. Director Garry Marshall was shooting for a Terms of Endearment-like mix of comedy and pathos, but he is at heart a comedy director. The laughs in the film are crisply paced, occasionally pointed, and generally entertaining. Those sequences are so much stronger than the tearjerking ending that the audience cannot help but be let down. However, the good material in this film makes it one of the more interesting films from Hanks in the 1980s. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
