Francois Dillinger is the boy!

Youth in Revolt – Miguel Arteta

Michael Cera’s plan of world domination seems to be continuing with his latest film, Youth in Revolt, a teenage, coming-of-age comedy about a young man wanting to be better at life, wanting to improve his skills with the ladies. It’s something a little different for Cera, playing two characters, and one being completely different to what you’ve expected from the shy, lonely guy he continually plays throughout his career. There has been a lot of criticism towards Cera seemingly playing the same kind of character in most of his work, but if your that good at something, why not? Many actors before played the same role, the infamous actors such as Marilyn Monroe clearly play the same person but because they are excellent at it, it’s okay. But as you can see, the more and more Cera plays the lead role, taking the film in the direction he wants, he’s becoming an overall better actor and learning new tricks and styles that will hopefully be seen in later work, especially the upcoming Scott Pilgrim vs. The World where reports suggest a much more mature performance from the Arrested Development actor.

But back to Youth in Revolt, a great little indie flick that showcases Cera in a new way playing Francois as well as playing the 16 year old Nick Twisp, a shy outcast with interests in different things and an eccentric family life. His family go on a cavern holiday and meet Sheeni, the girl of his dreams, they soon fall for each other, but Sheeni has a thing for bad boys, so Nick imagines a new personality for him to use, named Francois, with a deeper accent, a moustache and who’s French, Nick has two sides to himself, one for Sheeni and one for everyday life. It has a lovely romantic storyline involved and it’s defiantly laugh out loud funny in certain parts and does have a good ending, but for some reason, i just didn’t like Sheeni, i just couldn’t get over the fact how much of a dick she is. There are some nice cameos here too with Zach Galifinakis as Nick’s step Dad, Steve Buscemi as his real dad, Ray Liotta who plays a police officer and Justin Long as Sheeni’s old brother. A great little support cast.

Overall, a great film, it’s funny, it’s heart warming and it shows a good performance from Cera especially his take on Francois, the French boy. All his scenes wearing the moustache was pretty funny and i reckon it might become the film before the pinnacle moment of his career where he finally explodes onto the scene of being one of the best comedy actors, maybe not drama actors but defiantly in the realm of comedy. And who knows, the Arrested Development movie could be another great film for Cera too moving him into the position of head of the family, not Jason Bateman!

7/10

Simon Childs