‘Youth’ allows mellow actor to try new character

By Roger Ebert

Universal UClick

Michael Cera is not a sissy. It's more like he's unusually ... diffident. Laid back to a point approaching the horizontal.

Yet he yearns. He's so filled with desire it slops over. I speak not of the real Cera, unknown to me, but of the persona he has perfected in such movies as “Superbad,” “Juno,” “Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist” and “Paper Heart.”

 “Youth in Revolt” gives Cera the twee name Nick Twisp, surrounds his aging virgin act with divorced parents who are both shacked up with lustful vulgarians, and then provides him with a dream come true in the person of Sheeni Saunders,  played by Portia Doubleday.

They meet during family vacations at the sublimely named Restless Axles trailer park. For Sheeni, who speaks as if influenced by Juno, virginity is a once-touching affectation, and Nick Twisp is oh, so eager to join her in this opinion. But there are many obstacles to their bliss, worst of all his family's tragic return home.

His mother, Estelle (Jean Smart), lives with Jerry (Zach Galifianakis), a beer-swilling, belching lout who makes Nick's skin crawl. His father, George Twisp (Steve Buscemi), recently laid off, has robbed the cradle for his live-in, Lacey (Ari Graynor). Both parents all but flaunt their lovers before poor Nick; at Restless Axles, his mom asks Nick to clean up after dinner while she and Jerry retire to the bedroom a few feet away for noisy rumpy-pumpy.

Sheeni's parents have much less screen time, so they're cast to make an immediate impression. Nick is desperate to be reunited with Sheeni, tries to float reasons he needs to take a trip right way, and really inadvertently (honest) sets in motion an explosive, fiery chain of events.

Cera's style lends itself to one note, and the movie wisely gives him another character to play, an imaginary alter ego named Francois Dillinger, inspired by Jean-Paul Belmondo. Of course Nick would know who Belmondo is. I'd believe him if he were inspired by Jean Gabin. In this role, he has a mustache and smokes, but true to character, his mustache is wispy and he always smokes like it's his first cigarette.

It's often observed that comedy never works if an actor signals that he's just said something funny. I don't know if Michael Cera CAN do that. This passiveness is why he's funnyier than Jack Black, for example, in their movie “Year One.”

One of the secrets of “Youth in Revolt” is that Nick Twisp seems bewildered by his own desires and strategies. He knows how he feels, he knows what he wants, but he'd need a map to get from A to B.

It's Nick's self-abashing modesty that makes the movie work. Here, you feel, is a movie character who would find more peace on the radio.

FAST TAKERoger Ebert says: ***

 What: “Youth in Revolt”

Stars: Michael Cera, Portia Doubleday, Zach Galifianakis, Ray Liotta, Justin Long, Jean Smart, Adhir Kalyan, Fred Willard, Steve Buscemi

Where: Galaxy 16 Cine and Wynnsong 12 in Cedar Rapids; Coral Ridge 10 in Coralville; Sycamore 12 in Iowa City

Rated: R