Just Peck is about a teenager at the bottom of the social pyramid who befriends a popular and attractive girl.  Meanwhile his overbearing parents force him into the science fair and this results in an act of rebellion.

I basically checked this one out because I love Brie Larson.  She’s great in The United States of Tara and Scott Pilgrim vs The World. So I thought I’d give this movie a shot on a boring afternoon.  It also starred Kier Gilchrist, who plays her brother on Tara.  That one bit was a little weird, seeing how they play brother and sister to see them playing a more romantic relationship here.  But that weirdness subsides.

Anyway I found this movie to be a good satire of American high school life, if not a little too on the nose occasionally.  There’s lots of really good stuff done here especially on a script level.  Things like Peck learning how to rebel and how the characters of Emily (Larsen) & Peck are very different but share a lot of similarities too.  For example they have very different peer groups but both feel friendless and lost, and they both have very different home lives but both aren’t really good.

Speaking of the home, Peck’s parents are played by Marcia Cross and Adam Arkin, who both deliver spot on performances as parents who sort of live by parenting books.

But the real meat of the film lies in the Emily & Peck relationship.  It’s a unique friendship that you don’t often see in movies.  Instead of taking the easy way out and having them become lovers like most movies would this movie show that they instead become true friends, the kind that are hard to come by but you know will always be there for you.

Overall there’s more than enough good things here for me to recommend it.