Good Kids - Apfelkuchen war gestern

The movie was reasonably fun. The actors played well, the ideas were interesting, if not original, and besides a glaring lack of tension, it was an OK movie. It's the old idea of kids who decide to party before they each leave for college, but in this case there were "the good kids" which stayed home and virgin in order to study to get to the good colleges, so they have a "summer of yes" in which to do all the things they regretted not doing in high school. Yet they are all well off and ridiculously good looking and people like them so there are no real obstacles to overcome in reaching their goals. So yes, it's a feel good movie, but it's way too easy for them to feel good, so the viewer has little opportunity to empathize.

Nora (Zoey Deutch), Andy (Nicholas Braun), Lion (Mateo Arias), and Spice (Israel Broussard) are best friends since childhood. They are unflinchingly good kids in the poor side of the resort town and headed for good colleges. They refused to party or do anything bad. Lion teaches martial arts to little kids. One of his students invites him to her birthday party on the rich side of town where they've never been. The group of townie friends decide to go partying and do all the bad things that they missed.

This is a promising premise but newcomer Chris McCoy is unable to deliver on the hard-partying fun. The premise is built to be an one-crazy-night movie. Instead, it's all stretched out and it rambles around. There are some rom-com ideas but they're slapped together haphazardly. Although, it does lead to a surprisingly great friendzone conversation. The characters and actors are perfectly nice. Braun has his great lanky awkwardness. Zoey Deutch could do more awkwardness to help her character. The other two have less to do. They're all nice but this is nothing special or anything that funny.

The film is, for all intents and purposes, watchable.

This is where you ask, "Then why did you give it a 3 out of 10 and say it's not worth my time?" To which I reply, that is the truth.

The film is something that you can watch to pass the time but honestly even then it's not really worth your time.

My main complaint against this film would be the scripting and directing. The two give no build up or growth to the story they are trying to tell. It feels like scenes just slapped together to get to the end of the story with no emotion, plan or entertainment to it. The situations themselves do seem like they could have a decent pay off but cause there was no build up, it falls flat on it's uninspired face. And this is all the more frustrating as the idea (though not entirely unique) seems like it could be interesting.

The actors put up an 'okay' performance but are entirely underwhelmed by the poor writing of the script. Thus their characters are not fun to follow, they have pointless character arcs and even worse dialogue.

But my advice to you would be this, watch the introduction of the film as we are introduced to the characters and their world, that essentially is the tone of the whole movie and if you're like me, by the time the title card comes on, you'll know this movie is going to be a waste.

It was just like the British film 'Kids in Love' I'd seen prior to this. Explored only on a comedic side. Four friends who have been the ideal kids, after a few years later on one summer, before heading to the college, they have decided to accomplish everything they had missed in their life so far. So it's a time to blend in with what their kind do, but not as easy as it seems. Sometimes everything goes out of their proportion and some of them struggle at beginning itself. Overall, how their summer ends, in that, what they had gained and lost was told.

Written and directed by a newcomer. Really very good try. Good comedies and well performed actors. The four lead characters were unique. The story around them was nicely built. But not they all were equally balanced. Most of the focus was on Nicolas Braun and then Zoey. I kind of felt the scenes were intentionally done, but worth an attempt. Slightly predictable film, which was like any Hollywood teenage flick. At a time a few things stretch beyond our anticipation. Might not be the best teen flick, though worth a watch.

6/10

Another alright teen film. The only issue most of the plot is very unrealistic and not that funny.