In Shall We Dance?, Richard Gere plays a man in the throes of a mid-life crisis. This is new territory for the 55-year-old actor who's always found himself opposite considerably younger leading ladies. Here, he actually plays a man his age, and is married to someone a bit more believable. Has Gere finally grown up? Of course not! He decides taking ballroom dance lessons from a woman 20 years his junior will help out of his funk.Gere plays Chicago lawyer John Clark, a man in a rut. Day after depressing day, it's the same routine of drawing up a few wills, running a couple miles on the treadmill, and returning home to apathetic wife Beverly (Susan Sarandon) and their two teenage children. The only highlight of his day is the fleeting moment when the "L" train passes by the beautiful but solemn looking woman in the window of Miss Mitzi's Dance School. Drawn to her, John impulsively jumps off the train and into the dance studio where he's confident that lessons will bring happiness back to his life.
Continue reading: Shall We Dance? (2004) Review