Whatever happened to Nia Vardalos? Her sleeper triumph “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” came out in 2002, and nothing the actress has tried since then has really stuck to the wall.
That’s an eternity in showbiz years. But after doing some TV and a little-seen comedy called “Connie and Carla,” Vardalos is back this summer with two starring vehicles.
Coming in July is “I Hate Valentine’s Day,” which she also wrote and directed. Opening this weekend is “My Life in Ruins,” which picks up the Greek connection from her best known movie.
Meet Georgia (Vardalos), a Greek-American working for a second-rate tour company in the old country. As a tour guide, she’s unpopular, since she emphasizes history lessons over encouraging her charges to buy cheap knickknacks.
As we follow her on what she insists will be her final bus tour, we see what she’s been putting up with all this time: the tourists. She’s got them typed: Australians are party animals, Germans are loud, Americans are obnoxious, Canadians are nice.
Unfortunately for Georgia, the other tour guide always gets the Canadians.
As the movie rambles its way through the sites of ancient Greece, it isn’t hard to spot its ultimate destination — especially when the hairy yet hunky bus driver (Alexis Georgoulis) seems available for our love-starved heroine.
The Cupid role goes to Richard Dreyfuss, as a joke-cracking widower who professes magical powers. A little bit of Dreyfuss goes a long way, but director Donald Petrie (“Miss Congeniality”) doesn’t seem inclined to rein him in.
Other travelers include comedians Rachel Dratch and Harland Williams; if you know these two, you can guess they’re the obnoxious Americans.
It’s all TV-level and predictable, but oddly agreeable if you like Nia Vardalos and her swell-gal persona. The scenery is pleasant, the stereotypes are broad and recognizable, the romance is inevitable.
It’s a movie for the “Mamma Mia!” crowd, right down to the Greek setting. And when most summer films are aimed at teenage boys, Vardalos might find her fans starved for an alternative to sci-fi and fantasy … even if this is a different kind of fantasy.
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