And while these films may be repetitive and tame, I'll take them over what's happened to the college subgenre. My goodness.

Also should be noted that while there's maybe 3 high school films from the 80s and 3 h.s. films from the 90s that we remember and like, there was probably like 200 shitty ones released in the same period. Back then people were probably pissed about all the Hughes clones, too.

C


Charlie Bartlett wants to be a high school movie classic. It is not. It tries to channel John Hughes and it fails. The movie is simply not dramatic, realistic or emotional enough to work as drama and not funny enough to be a solid comedy. That said, both elements are present, it is just not a good mixture in this case. Like trixster has implied, there's a line here between a serious subject matter and comedy and the movie just doesn't walk this line well enough.

Anton Yelchin does the best he can with the script, but his character is just not well-written. He usually comes across as rather annoying and self-indulgent more than anything. I did lie Kat Dennings and Robert Downey Jr., though. In particular the latter has a decent role and some fine moments at the film's end. His interaction with Charlie Bartlett is one of the film's few highlights. And there are really only a few. The problem is that it wants to come across as understanding of teenage issues and wants for its audiences to relate with the characters. At the same time, it just never feels genuine. It lacks the warmth, the natural feel and the charm of well-made high school movies. Did I also mention that it's not very funny?

Very Ferris Bueller-esque in nature though obviously not as good. It has a good mix of comedy and drama to make it a noteworthy film in the genre. Yelchin and Downey Jr. are fantastic and they work off each other quite well.