Charlie Bartlett

This started out great, and really seemed like it was going in a dangerous direction most teen movies haven’t dared to go. Unfortunately, the second half goes over a cliff, and the story tries to recover from all the political incorrectness by exploiting every hacky cliché from the genre. The lead actor, Anton Yelchin, is supremely talented, but only at times is this on display. Sometimes he veers into a really annoying, over-talented, Dakota Fanning territory -- where he knows he’s really talented, and he comes off as disingenuous... so you want to punch him in the face. Kudos, though, to Kat Dennings as the sweet girlfriend. She’s destined for great things. Otherwise, this was below par, so I can’t really recommend it. It had hope, but lost its way.