'Perfect Score' is remedial viewing for the teen set

Someone got the bright idea to take elements of "The Breakfast Club" and "Ocean's Eleven" and create a high-school heist movie with a diverse group uniting with a common, screw-the-establishment purpose.

MOVIE REVIEW

THE PERFECT SCORE

DIRECTOR: Brian Robbins

CAST: Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Erika Christensen

RUNNING TIME: 95 minutes

RATING: PG-13 for language, sexual content and some drug references

WHERE: Bella Bottega 11, Cinema 17, Crossroads 8, East Valley 13, Everett 9, Factoria, Gateway 8, Grand Cinemas, Issaquah 9, Marysville Cinema 14, Meridian 16, Monroe 12, Mountlake 9, Oak Tree, Parkway Plaza 12, South Hill Mall, Woodinville 12

GRADE: C

The result is the bland comedy "The Perfect Score," which possesses little of the snap or charisma of the films that inspired it. Yet it's still better than half of last year's teen movies, a genre fading fast.

Teen films, it seems, have recycled other movies to the point where they're outright ripping them off now. One character suggests they mimic "The Breakfast Club" and share their deepest secrets while smoking marijuana. Two buddies are referred to as "Pacey and Dawson," while another studies heist techniques by watching "Heat."

The cast is made up of a representative from every clique: Kyle (Chris Evans), a good student who needs a better score to get into his dream school; Matty (Bryan Greenberg), who only wants to get into the same state school as his girlfriend; Francesca (Scarlett Johansson, pre-"Lost in Translation"), a neglected rich girl; Desmond (Darius Miles of the Portland Trailblazers), an athlete looking to play college basketball; Anna (Erika Christensen), an overachiever pressured to get into Brown; and Roy (Leonardo Nam), a slacker pothead who happened to eavesdrop on the plan.

Their goal is unanimous: to rise against the dreaded SAT, the standardized exam that dictates their future, or as Kyle says, "It's not about who you are -- it's about who you'll be." So they conspire to steal the answers to boost their scores and achieve their individual dreams.

One plan goes awry, and they wind up planning an elaborate scheme involving rope ladders, computer hacking and blueprints. But how fun is that, really, when half of the cast has to stand outside and watch?

Director Brian Robbins, the former "Head of the Class" actor who has helmed a number of teen projects, fills in a number of unnecessary fantasy sequences, in particular a ridiculous one featuring Johansson as a "Matrix" heroine. Despite the trilogy's recent resurgence, spoofing it feels dated.

Even Christensen's talent displayed in "Traffic" is wasted here, and the other cast members paint by the numbers. Only Nam, in a pot-induced drawl, infuses the film with great comic timing. Seems he's the lone overachiever in this class.

Ellen A. Kim is a free-lance movie and music writer based in Seattle. She can be reached via e-mail at Lnakim@hotmail.com.