YOUTH IN REVOLT

dMYD
Starring Michael Cera

M

Do you like Michael Cera? I like Michael Cera. He’s a prince of downbeat, an envoy of perfect reactionary shots and doe-eyed monkey boy indie romanticism. He’s not annoying yet. If you sort of like Michael Cera, you’ll sort-of-like Youth in Revolt. You’ll sort-of-like ‘The Guy From The Hangover’s’ chubtastic cameo as a failbag stepfather, you’ll sort-of-like the pretentious ridiculousness of a drawn-out summer romance based on a love of French art-house cinema, with superfluous gay jokes. The film rambles along, gently tugging at your attention with a peppering of quirky narrative spikes (running from the pigs, squirreling out on mushrooms, Steve Buscemi) to keep you interested. The narration is pleasant, the acting’s great and little Mikey even gets to change his shtick for a while towards a promising future role as a chain-smoking paedophile. It’s good. It’s a good film, but it’s not that funny. Don’t expect a chuckle factory and you’ll be pleasantly entertained by the every-so-slightly edgy niceness of it all. Diverting, or something, but this is hardly Cera’s masterpiece. Time to dig out some Arrested Development (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Arrested-Development-Complete-Seasons-1-3/dp/B002JIN1KC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1267007417&sr=8-1) or wait until August for ‘A RENZOKUKEN TO THE FACE OF THE ENTIRE FILM INDUSTRY, THE MOVIE’ for his reason for existing on the Earth.