Youth in Revolt is the adaptation of C.D. Paynes cult book by the same title. It follows the storyline of his first three novellas (later combined into a single book) that follow a young man by the name of Nick Twisp, who after discovering the love of his life does whatever he must to stay with her.The film itself is a far cry from the hilarious prose of the witty novel that inspired it. However by itself, Youth in Revolt is surely a great romantic comedy, and Michael Cera's best performance to date. If you are looking for a short, well-directed, well-acted and hilarious romp then look no further. This is a movie I think all movie buffs should add to their collection and one that sadly went unnoticed in theaters.
After you watch the movie, if you find the characters entertaining I highly suggest picking up the books. They are a light read, very entertaining and even more well-crafted than this short feature film.
Two Thumbs Up!
BAD:
1. Quite short. A 90 minute romp through a 500-page novel. What?
2. CUTS! Many characters from the novel such as Apurva and Fuzzy hve been severed from the movie. Maybe Apurva was cut from them film to emphasize Nick's love for Sheeni. But Fuzzy's cut? He's the whole reason they can go to the French boarding school in Act II. What?
3. No Carlotta, really! If you have read the book you know what I mean with this.
That's it for the bad.
GOOD:
1. Hysterical! Does this really need an explanation? It's funny!
2. Animation sequences. These occur at certain points in the film to facilitate scenes. Very creative!
3. Good Acting/Cameos. The film has very good acting. Michael Cera and Portia Doubleday really steal the show. Also, they have an ensemble cast of cameos, such as Fred Willard and Steve Buscemi. Very well acted.
4. Quite faithful to the novel. Miguel Arteta did good with the novel. No new characters were introduced, only cuts.
Overall Score: 9.0 out of 10
A ten, but not really any Carlotta and no Apurva or Fuzzy. And, way too short.
Buy Youth in Revolt (2009) Now
This is a film that seems strange at first watching, but after a second viewing the movie is absolutely hilarious. Similar to films like "Little Miss Sunshine" and "Observe in Report," "Youth in Revolt" is an indie-esque movie with amazing performances praising its great source material. This is my favorite film with Michael Cera, and he definately displays all of his talent in this movie. The ability to play two distinct personalities that do not seem as if they are the same person, is a quality that makes Cera a fine actor. The supporting cast is perfectly formed with actors like Buscemi and Justin Long. I disagree with the critical reviews saying that Cera and Doubleday have no chemistry. Their chemistry is practically flowing out of my big screen and spilling onto the floor. And then I'll have to call Stanley Steamer to clean the chemistry off my rug. Anyway, what makes this a five star film follows:*Hilarious script due to source material
*Every actor perfect for the role
*Amazing soundtrack that's worth buying
*The indie flavor to the film
*Crisp cinematography
*Animations and claymations(very creative way to move through a scene)
Is it worth getting on blu-ray you ask? Absolutely! The picture looks astonishing. The special features kind of lack, but there's enough to satisfy the casual Blu-rayer. Youth in Revolt is not for everyone, but it's one of my favorite comedies. Now I'm definately drawn to the C.D. Payne books. I'll be satisfied if they're half this entertaining.
Read Best Reviews of Youth in Revolt (2009) Here
*** This review may contain spoilers ***I really wanted to like 'Youth in Revolt' since it began with a likable protagonist, Nick Twisp (in another typical Michael Cera 'insecure with woman' role) and his love interest, Sheeni Saunders (played by attractive newcomer, Portia Doubleday). Also in the mix is a quirky supporting cast including such luminaries as Steve Buscemi, Zach Galifianakis, Ray Liotta and Justin Long.
One is immediately drawn to Nick and Sheeni with their intellectual discussions focusing particularly on film (Nick loves art house Japanese director Ozu and Sheeni is a committed Francophile, with a particular infatuation for the famed French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo). You would never guess that Nick and Sheeni were so cerebral and liberal minded. considering the background of their parents. Nick's mother Estelle has taken up with a low-life boyfriend, Jerry (Galifianakis) who has just sold a lemon of a car to three sailors who want their money back. Jerry and Estelle with Nick in tow, take off for Clearlake (California) where they spend the week in a beat up trailer. Later Jerry has a heart attack and dies and Estelle takes up with an obnoxious Oakland police officer. Meanwhile, Sheeni's parents, who are more middle class, also happen to be fanatical fundamentalist Christians and won't let Sheeni keep 'Albert', a mangy mutt that Nick has purchased for Sheeni.
All of the offbeat banter and characters proves pretty engaging for the first thirty minutes of the film until Nick invents an alter-ego character, Francois Dillinger to help him win Sheeni's heart (he also must contend with Sheeni's preppie boyfriend, Trent Preston, who seeks to undermine Nick at every turn). The alter-ego assisting an insecure male in an attempt to woo a seemingly unobtainable love interest calls to mind the Woody Allen classic,"Play It Again Sam". You'll recall that the 70s comedy also features a lovable loser who must call upon an iconic film figure to help transform himself into a character who is decidedly confident with women. Play It Again Sam works because the alter-ego is Humphrey Bogart, who not only represents the apotheosis of male confidence with women but also the 'bad boy' who refuses to dispense with his ethical principles despite all the temptations (in Play It Again Sam, Bogart plays Rick, the good guy cafe owner from Casablanca, who saves the girl and defeats the Nazis).
Youth in Revolt, on the other hand, unfortunately gets it all wrong. Dillinger, with his pencil thin moustache, is also supposed to be a 'bad boy', attractive to women. But unlike Bogie, he's ethically challenged. He ends up advising Nick to "blow up half of Berkeley". Nick listens to his wilder, demented half and ends up crashing Jerry's Lincoln into a restaurant, causing a fire. Nick's now a wanted man (or rather a juvenile delinquent wanted by the police). Nick does more sorry things.
After going to the exclusive French private girl's boarding school where Sheeni has been exiled by her parents, Nick meets Bernice Lynch, Sheeni's next door neighbor at school, and tells her that Trent has been badmouthing her. In order to get back at Trent, he convinces Lynch to place sedatives in Sheeni's drinks. Sheeni ends up getting expelled after constantly falling asleep in class.
Since Dillinger is so unlikeable and Nick constantly takes his advice, we lose complete respect for the protagonist. Unlike Woody Allen, who through Bogart's advice becomes self-actualized, Nick becomes completely unhinged. At the end of the film, Nick attempts to stage his own death by pretending to be in a car that falls off a cliff. The bungled stunt is seen for what it is in front of a few local police officers who observe Nick fleeing in his underpants. What kind of moral are we supposed to take away from this film? That committing crimes are advisable, leading to success with women? In the end, even Sheeni has lost her sheen. She falls for the pathetic Nick and appears to acquiesce in his misbehavior. It's Sheeni who reassures him that he'll only do three months in the slammer.
Nick has more than one sidekick in 'Youth in Revolt' and they're all underdeveloped. His best friend Lefty has little screen time and by watching the DVD extras you can see that the rest of his scenes were left on the cutting room floor. Better is the second sidekick, Vijay, an Indian from South Africa played by the talented Adhir Kalyan who I predict we will see more of in the years to come. Vijay has a few amusing bits when he accompanies Nick in his foray to Sheeni's boarding school. He's also seen in an animated sequence while he drives with Nick in his grandmother's car. Finally there's Paul, Sheeni's brother, who Nick bonds with for a short time over a bunch of psychedelic mushrooms.
While the quirky characters which I alluded to before are initially engaging, they are all so underdeveloped that by the time the film concludes, we care little about them. Buscemi is particularly left high and dry in his one-note depiction of a constantly angry parent who finds himself unable to connect and bond with his alienated son.Youth in Revolt does have some rather neat 'claymation' animated sequences, highlighted during the opening and closing credits. Coupled with an effective 'folky' soundtrack as well as clever editing, 'Youth' comes across better for its look rather than its content.
I don't know how the films' backers could have allowed the scenarists here to so easily undermine the solid character of the films' protagonists. This could have been a simple story about an insecure, geeky kid who gains confidence with women by inventing and then following the lead of his own 'bad boy' creation--a bad boy however, that still has some heart and soul. Unfortunately, the alter ego has no class and it makes little sense that the 'good kid' would choose to go down such a dark path.
Want Youth in Revolt (2009) Discount?
There aren't very many adaptations of books into film that manage to not to wreck themselves. I am very happy to say Youth in Revolt does not mangle the book, but in fact adds a layer of realism and earnest emotion that the book strays away from.Youth in Revolt is a teenage fantasy coming-of-age story set in central and northern California, about one young man's quest for love. Beyond this basic setting, we have no other cues to tell us when the action is happening; the protagonist Nick uses a computer that looks like it's from 1992, the teenage characters all speak with Shakespearean wit, and everyone seems to regularly write letters and keep journals. (Like I said, it's a fantasy.)
This otherworldly element was fortunately imported in from the original book. Another spectacular motif that was thankfully maintained is showing the extreme lengths teenage guys will go for love; some of the more twisted elements of the novel (like Nick drugging his girlfriend so she is expelled from school and forced to go back to her hometown, also where he forced his father to move) ring true to the source material. Which I think is really commendable and brave on the filmmakers' part; not many studios would make a movie where the character we are supposed to sympathize with pulls that kind of stunt, even in the name of love.
What the film does even better is bringing this often-fantastical story back down to earth. Eventually Nick's crimes (yes, they are crimes) do catch up with him and he is forced to reconcile with his past, while in the book he is able to skirt it yet again. In literature though, disbelief is much more easily suspended than in film, so it is refreshing to see this problem actually brought to light for a medium in which that plot development is simply implausible.
The film also humanizes the actions taken by the characters. Both the young lovers, Nick and Sheeni, pull some pretty bad s*** throughout the course of the story. Exhausted with the situation, Sheeni eventually tells Nick that she can't put up with Nick's shenanigans any longer. "I'm tired of being alone." He thoughtfully replies, "I've been alone all my life. That's why I'm doing this." A real motive is fueling their love, not just the boredom of disaffected youth (which appears to be the case in the novel).
One minor (unrealistic) critique I have of the film is how comparatively minor in scope the movie is when looking at the novel. The original is an epic 500-page trilogy of books (bound together in one volume) and deservedly so; Nick goes through a lot to finally win over Sheeni. I had been expecting similar treatment for the film (clocking in at at least 2 1/2 hours?) but alas, my contemporary American epic can apparently be told in 90 minutes. Still, I'm amazed they pulled off the stellar project they did.
This movie seems perfect for our contemporary era of culture and sophistication re-entering the base requirements for courtship. The characters (convincingly) discuss arthouse film and dress fashionably (but affordably). Despite its more fantastical elements, this film still seems incredibly weighted and a more realistic depiction of teenage life (well, mine anyways!) than the typical teen sex comedy fare you get in the multiplexes. By far the best high school film in recent memory, and one of the best movies of 2009.
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