"Charlie Bartlett": prescription for a solid teen comedy

In the continuum of teen comedies, "Charlie Bartlett" is an overachiever that fares better than most by striving to harness the charming wisdom of "Rushmore" and the goofy good times of "Ferris Bueller's Day Off." The lessons about angsty dilemmas facing modern high-schoolers and the morals inherent in the solutions they choose are a little off target, but the movie's heart is squarely in the right place.

Even though the package of script, direction and physical execution falls short of those earlier teen genre standouts, the movie conveys a generally agreeable manner thanks primarily to the fine performances of Anton Yelchin, as the sweetly sunny title character, and Robert Downey Jr., as a bottoming-out alcoholic high-school principal.

Charlie's a poor little rich kid who's been bounced to Downey's charge from the latest private school to expel him for bad behavior. He's not a bad kid; he's just learned to exploit his smarts as a means of gaining the popularity he so desperately craves.

As a scheme to fit in at public school, Charlie discovers that his proficiency with psychiatric lingo — his cuckoo-bananas mother (Hope Davis, also in fine form) keeps an army of doctors on retainer — is the key to getting other kids in his corner. He appoints himself the student-body "psychiatrist," dispensing advice and psychotropic drugs (gained from his own therapy sessions) from the boys' restroom. Though it's played for laughs, the situation doesn't seem so far-fetched with the misuse of prescription drugs such a hot-button issue these days.

Charlie's practice eventually takes a somber turn, which leads to the first dust-up between him and Principal Gardner. Their conflict increases when Gardner's teenage daughter (Kat Dennings) falls under Charlie's genial sway. The scenes Downey and Yelchin share crackle with a naturalness that makes their dialogue seem all the more spontaneous. It's a powerful chemistry that doesn't feel forced.

That's not always true for some issues in the script. The general depiction of student life and administration policy, including a plot thread about security cameras in the school clubhouse, undermines an atmosphere that is otherwise largely credible. There are also clumsy bits and mediocre acting.

Nonetheless, "Charlie Bartlett" is a far cry from the silly fluff of most teen comedies.

Ted Fry: tedfry@hotmail.com