She's Out of My League (Jim Field Smith, 2010)

"I love Kirkey but let's face it, the guy's a 5. Meanwhile, this Molly is a hard 10.

Stainer, that's just dirty pool. He's at least a 6...
6? Alright, you go ahead and pop rainbows into his asshole, but I'm just being honest."

A film in which the awkward but endearing Kirk (Jay Baruchel) comes to terms with the fact that the űber hot Molly (Alice Eve) kinda digs him. Kirk has to contend with Mollys handsome ex, his buddies conflicting advice and a series of social confusions which seem to ruin any remaining chances he might have to build a relationship with lovely Molly. In the end crippling self doubt is his biggest challenge, but then the path to true love never does run smooth.

As the lights went down my expectations were hovering around the middle of the road. There can be no doubt that I wanted an entertaining experience but was also well aware that there was no spectacular element which had made She's Out of My League a must see movie. Despite having recently had a fun time in the Hot Tub Machine I remain painfully aware that these type of films can easily be a let down. I went into Superbad with Michael Cera shaped hopes and left distinctly unimpressed, my head hanging low.

In fact the film managed to stay on a pretty steady path by being neither fantastic nor awful. Rather unfortunately the central concept has a fundamental flaw in that there is never a proper explanation for why the super sexy Molly would look twice at nerdy Kirk, that of course being the point geeks like me are especially interested in. She mumbles something about him being funny and he's certainly polite to the point of ridiculousness but somehow that doesn't feel like quite enough. There are a couple of tender moments, some funny philosophising on numerically scored levels of attractiveness and finally a predictable revelation about her ex which makes the poetic license slightly acceptable. It still requires a leap of faith to remove the nagging sense that this simply wouldn't happen.

Frankly I can't stand it when films tone down the content just to get a lower certification and hence a larger potential slice of audience. But rudeness can be funny damnit! In this case it turned out that the most crude of example of humour was what let the film down the most. In what can only be described as an actual ball shaving sequence the story hit its lowest ebb, being unfunny to the point of cringeworthy. Thankfully the rest of the swearing and suchlike was creative enough so there should be some commendation for the makers as they mildly pushed the envelope by making it a 15. Of course the sight of Alice Eve in her underwear was not entirely unpleasant.

Often in these male skewed romantic comedies the supporting cast provides the best of the funnies to allow the leads to do the schmatlzy. She's Out of My League certainly offered up some feisty characters, Kirks best friend Stainer (T.J. Miller) has some of the funniest lines including tough yet necessary responses to the troubles in lovelife. Likewise Mollys confidante Patty (Krysten Ritter) had a promising opening scene on an aeroplane but alas, then largely disappeared from view. Indeed there's a juicy spark between Stainer and Patti which just wasn't capitalised on. Both dads feel pretty pointless although Kirks mum (Debra Jo Rupp) did have a certain manic charm. His whiny ex girlfriend was given too much screentime and hence got pretty annoying while Mollys ex hunk wasn't given enough rope to make him a proper villain. Ultimately the ending was too abrupt for my liking and the small subplots weren't allowed to breathe although at least some of the pop culture references were smart enough to make me grin.

All in all tis never hilarious or compelling but a decent effort from an adequate cast. Rams the message about inner beauty home a little too often but earns some stripes for Stainers righteous anger. Next up is a trip to Shutter Island.