Charlie Bartlett

Anton Yelchin and Robert Downey Jr. in "Charlie Bartlett" (Credit: MGM)

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Rich kid and genuinely nice guy Charlie Bartlett (Anton Yelchin, promising) makes a mark on his high school by selling prescription drugs, offering free counseling services in the boys’ bathroom, befriending a bully (Tyler Hilton) and dating the principal’s daughter (Kat Dennings). None of this, as you’d imagine, goes over very well with the principal himself (Robert Downey Jr., solid as always).

Big question: Can “Charlie Bartlett” succeed in its obvious attempt at combining “Rushmore” and “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”?

Skip it: First-time screenwriter Gustin Nash’s script diagnoses every teen with a case of the blahs and, without depth or realism, blames most of the malaise on dysfunctional parents and stereotypical high school clique-osity. (If only the class bully could get up the nerve to ask out the hottest blonde in school!) All the blathering about pills and depression will only make you whip out DVDs of “My So-Called Life,” “Freaks and Geeks” or any other superior TV version of what “Charlie Bartlett” is going for.

Catch it: The movie actually opens with a lot of promise, thanks to Charlie’s good-hearted ingenuity and a look at the difference between being liked and being respected. Plus, a lesson Charlie learns about public school: You’ll never fit in if you show up with a chauffeur!

Bottom line: It’s easy to go along with Charlie’s ability to unite the school through medication—what teen’s going to turn down a quick fix?—until you wonder why every student trusts him with their secrets and why “Charlie Bartlett” feels the need to spell out the differences between cool and uncool, rich and poor. The movie’s got an identity crisis, all right: It’s trapped between an entertaining story of a kid who can help everyone but himself and a superficial teen movie whose “Everyone’s an insecure dork” message seems straight out of an Amanda Bynes movie—and, in fact, was the main idea of Bynes' even more shallow “Sydney White.”

Bonus: While convincing a suicidal kid that life is worth living, Charlie reminds him of the beauties of music, food from all over the world and Internet porn. Be careful if you try to enjoy these simultaneously!

What do you think of 'Charlie Bartlett'? Email me: mpais@tribune.com

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