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John Travolta shambles drunkenly around New Orleans as the title character in this Southern Gothic–lite drama from Shainee Gabel. Bobby Long is a down-and-out former literature professor who now lives in an alcoholic haze with his teaching assistant and protégé, Lawson Pines (Gabriel Macht). When their friend, whose house they live in, dies, her angry young daughter Pursy (played opaquely by Scarlett Johansson) moves in with them, and each side attempts to annoy the other into moving out. Then, of course, a friendship among the three evolves. Macht is awfully pretty to be playing someone so dissolute, but his Lawson has a simple charm that makes him the most appealing of the three characters. Gabel films their squalor with a romantic glow that makes poverty and unemployment seem nicer than it is, and she allows the romantic ambiance of New Orleans to run over the plot. As Pursy tells Bobby, "You are such a shameless ham." Couldn’t have said it better myself. (119 minutes)
BY BROOKE HOLGERSON
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