Adventureland: The Review

I’ll say this right up front: Miramax had no freaking clue how to market this film. While it’s from Greg Mottola, director of Superbad, it doesn’t have the vulgar insults and laughs that film had. It’s instead a more sincere coming of age story, but what you’ll think watching the trailer — especially the Redband one — is that its just like his former movie, and there lies the disappointment.

Another minor complaint I had was with the lead actor, Jesse Eisenberg. It felt like he was trying to perform in a role that Michael Cera practically invented — and had the charisma of a wet mop for the first half of the film. He let people kick him in the balls, no retaliation, and seemed like he was on prozac the whole time… just floating along.

That’s with the entire film does — just floats along. It’s not a bad film and I don’t regret watching it, but there are no big twists and it sticks pretty close to the predictable formula. When you see the ads on TV for this ‘comedy’, just remember, they’re using the Greek definition: a story with a happy or cheerful ending.