Slowing down and taking it easy are unfamiliar concepts to 72-year-old Victor Martin (William Shatner). Once a test pilot for NASA, he now spends his days zooming around Palm Springs in his Porsche with his best friend, Sal (Christopher Lloyd), as his co-pilot. Vick is not only obsessed with his precious vehicle, but he enjoys partying, drinking, picking up much younger woman, and generally living life at full throttle.
While most people think he has a great life, law enforcement, and in particular the new District Attorney, has decided to come down on elderly drivers. They are nothing but a hazard to everyone in the community and should have their driver’s licenses revoked at any opportunity.
But that’s not any real concern for Vick, who is having too much fun to pay attention to what is going on around him. He’s a great driver as he continues to fly up and down the city streets with Sal at his side. He is so confident in his skills that he’s willing to challenge anyone to a drag race, even Diego (Esai Morales), a young punk in a low rider that gives him some lip.
Even though Vick gets busted by the police and lightly reprimanded, he continues his aggressive driving. Again, he takes another crack at Diego, racing him down the city streets. Having a more powerful car, he handily wins but ends up spinning out of control, flies through a parking lot, and almost plows through a couple dozen people seated outside at a restaurant. This time the law does not overlook his shenanigans and he quickly finds himself in the court room having to defend himself to a judge who ends not only taking his license away but permanently impounds his car.
Still in a state of denial, Victor must some to terms with his new reality and the results of his behavior. He hires an attorney, Rock Kendall (Don McCanus), to help him regain his license and most importantly his car, but until that can happen, he will have to ride the local senior citizen bus. This is Vick’s worst nightmare, having no vehicle, and being considered an old person. While at this lowest point, he finds a small glimmer of hope in Caroline (Jean Smart), an eccentric woman who runs an organic health food restaurant, is a huge desert tortoise activist who also rides the bus.
After this initial setup for the film, it follows a very formulaic romance-movie pattern as Vick and Caroline are attracted to one another, start getting close, a misunderstanding occurs forcing one of them to make a big romantic gesture, and ultimately, they are both brought back together after learning an important life lesson.
The DVD is supposed to contain three Special Features. “Director/Producer Commentary,” Behind the Scenes with the Cast and Crew of Senior Moment,” and “Bad Boy Rocker Music Video.” At least that’s what it said on the box, but the copy I reviewed had no Special Features at all. Hopefully, that was intentional for the review copy and not a flaw in the DVD release that has gone unnoticed.
The film has several very famous and fan-favorite actors. Because of this, the film is enjoyable and entertaining. However, the overall story is a bunch of light fluff that reminded me more of a Hallmark Channel movie than an actual feature-length film. It’s definitely better than all of those television programs with its more comedic feel, but it’s quite comparable. All of the relationships seemed a little light and shallow and could have used some more depth and introspection to fully flesh them out. It kind of felt like the director expected you to fill in all the blanks on your own without any additional assistance from the storyline. I would have liked to have seen a little more of the Diego interaction as he and Vick bonded as well as Rock and his group as they went through the various training courses to get Vick his license back. Those moments were also some of the funniest and could have added much value to the overall presentation. Even an “evil” District Attorney that played more of a role would have helped add some tension.
Senior Moment is worth watching if you are a fan of the actors and like catching up with their new projects. It’s a very nice film and a light piece of relaxing entertainment that doesn’t require any extra involvement on the audiences part and doesn’t try too hard to be anything more than what it is.
