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Charlie Bartlett

(No longer in theaters)

Rating: R — for language, drug content and brief nudity
Director: Jon Poll Cast: Anton Yelchin, Robert Downey Jr., Hope Davis, Kat Dennings, Tyler Hilton
Running Time: 97 minutes
Reader Rating:
2.0 out of 10
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1 Reviews | Write a Review

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Genre

Comedy

Producer

Baron Kidd, Sidney Kimmel, David Permut, Jay Roach

Distributor

MGM

Release Date

Feb 22, 2008

Release Notes

Nationwide

Official Website

charliebartlett-themovie.com

Review

It’s cornball, derivative, and full of clunkers, but the teen comedy Charlie Bartlett has a core of authenticity. It’s an authentic wannabe. The disaffected-rich-kid hero (Anton Yelchin) with the absent dad and kooky narcotized mom (Hope Davis) wants more than anything to be popular—to be loved. So does the movie. The gimmick is that he becomes the school drug dealer—but not of pot or Ecstasy. He sells psychopharmacological drugs he pries from psychiatrists by reciting DSM-IV symptoms. The movie doesn’t begin to get at the deeper meaning of all this—probably for the best. The Elizabeth Wurtzel rewrite would go straight to video.

Gustin Nash’s script works off a good template—bits of the punk-tinged eighties teen anthem Pump Up the Volume and the mighty Rushmore. (The editor turned director, Jon Poll, must like Wes Anderson, too, since he appropriates the twee symmetry.) Like Rushmore, Charlie Bartlett builds to a psychological wrestling match between a young hipster-narcissist and his middle-aged counterpart. The older incarnation is the alcoholic high-school principal and father of Charlie’s girlfriend (the luminous Kat Dennings), and he’s played by Robert Downey Jr. What a stroke of casting: Downey watches a kid in a role he’d have played, a role made for his teenage self. And we watch both the actor and the character struggle to reconcile himself to playing the authority figure—ready or not. — David Edelstein

We got free passes to see a pre-screening of this movie, and our only consolation was that at least we didnÂ’t have to pay to see it. This movie couldnÂ’t decide if it was a teenage hijinks comedy, a la "Superbad," or a touching coming-of-age film, so it tried to be both and failed miserably at each. Characters were poorly developed, the plot was slow, and there were several "almost" climaxes that were resolved before they ever got dramatic. The actress who played the mother was the only bright spot in the movie. She was funny and charming, but unfortunately, her role was small. They should have added her to more scenes and removed all of the other characters. The only possible redeeming value that this movie *might* have had would have been the message to teens that they should think for themselves and avoid drugs. However, the movie's "R" rating (due in large part to a two-second scene where girls run topless past the camera, which in no way contributes to the plot) ensures that the ONLY people who might benefit from this movie arenÂ’t old enough to see it.

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