Youth in Revolt (15)

Alison Rowat's Review

Stop me in the highly likely event you’ve been through this Michael Cera movie before.

The star of Superbad and Juno, movies in which he played a gentle soul with a nice line in sarky wit, here plays another basically sweet guy with a lot to say for himself. Spot the difference? Me neither.

This time round, he doesn’t have the saving grace of a funny script. Cera is Nick Twisp, custodian of two loser parents (Steve Buscemi and Jean Smart) and a virginity he can’t seem to lose.

A holiday romance looks like the answer, but when that fails to take off, geeky Nick brings on a suave alter-ego, Francois Dillinger, to give him confidence.

Cameos from the likes of Ray Liotta and Fred Willard aside, it’s a laugh lite affair.

Paul Greenwood's Review

You wait ages for a character named Francois, then two come along in the same week. Here it’s Francois Dillinger, the alternate persona of the smart and sensitive Nick (Michael Cera), whom he invents to try to win a girl (Portia Doubleday) he meets on holiday.

Though she’s sent away to an exclusive school, he concocts a series of schemes in order to be with her, many of them perpetrated by the rebellious and disdainful Francois.

While it’s nice to see Cera stepping out of his nervous comfort zone, at least for part of the time, he’s getting a little long in the tooth to still be playing teenagers, and this is a film much too beholden to quirkiness.

No teenager in history speaks the way these kids do and it’s wry rather than funny, while the rambling nature of the plot coupled with the unlikeable characters ensures interest wanes long before the end.