I Love You, Beth Cooper 2009

Ben Lyons, At the Movies: This is dreadful. This is a pathetic excuse for a movie. Read more

Mary F. Pols, MSN Movies: The mood doesn't build on itself, the emotional moments barely register and you start to hope the sun will rise soon. Read more

A.O. Scott, New York Times: If fun is what you're looking for, you might want to avoid I Love You, Beth Cooper, a drab and incoherent teen comedy. Read more

Kevin B. Lee, Time Out: This nightmare scenario is to high-school valedictorians what this wreck of a movie is to comedy screenwriters. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: With roles that seem tailor-made for Michael Cera and Jonah Hill, this nerd wish-fulfillment comedy reminded me of Superbad, though a more accurate title might be Sub-Bad. Read more

Scott Tobias, AV Club: I Love You, Beth Cooper tries to exploit and explode broad stereotypes, but it never transcends the labels it applies. Read more

Kerry Lengel, Arizona Republic: Every time the story shows some glimmer of originality, it immediately retreats back to formula. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Panettiere, I'm sad to report, is a dud as the title character, a supposed wild thang who never rises above the level of runty, obnoxious mall chick, down to the roll-on tan. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: I Love You, Beth Cooper provides so few laughs I nearly wandered out of the theater midway to go look for some somewhere. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: The script by Larry Doyle, based on his novel, has some smart flashes, and a few of the young performers resemble real people and not the usual prefab teen idols. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: Like the high school's bison mascot, this romp is lean on fresh laughs. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: A sweet effort that touches all the bases that have been touched so many times before. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: The story is timeless; this could have taken place when [screenwriter] Doyle graduated in '76 -- or any year, really, since the effects of high school linger throughout adult life and nerds are forever. Read more

Eric D. Snider, Film.com: Wants to emulate a John Hughes film, in much the same way that a crack whore wearing a dime-store tiara wants to emulate Queen Elizabeth. Read more

Amy Nicholson, I.E. Weekly: If watching this makes you long to be young again, you probably grew up in an Algerian prison. Read more

Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times: A flat, tired rehash of teen movie story tropes, the film attempts to have it both ways by winkingly acknowledging its secondhand origins. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: As pleasurable as revisiting the glossy, witty, misadventure-filled realm Hughes created for his adolescent characters is, you've also been here before. Often. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: This unfunny, unoriginal, charmless teen comedy is so stunningly awful from start to finish, it's amazing to think its director has made a single film before, much less a dozen. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: Makes for a lively and refreshing glimpse into how the other half lives. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: A miscast and misjudged graduation-night comedy, Cooper occasionally -- only occasionally -- wanders into 'harmless.' Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: The charmlessness of its central characters -- Rust's charisma-challenged Denis, Panettiere's Barbie-hard and vacuous Beth -- makes this putative farce all the more difficult to endure. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: The filmmakers lacked the courage and conviction to tell an honest, character-based story and resorted to something that has been massaged into a more comfortable, easily consumable cinematic morsel. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: The writer of I Love You, Beth Cooper says the story is based on a dream. I believe him. This is one of the very few movies where I wanted the hero to wake up and discover it was only a dream. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Aiming for the heartfelt hilarity of Superbad, I Love You, Beth Cooper is just super bad. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com: I Love You, Beth Cooper moves along, taking two steps backward into crassness for every clever or just plain sweet moment it offers. Read more

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: Beth Cooper isn't a terrible addition to the teen coming-of-age party movie catalog. It just feels dated. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Suffering through I Love You, Beth Cooper is like being locked in detention with five idiots misquoting The Breakfast Club. Read more

Stephen Cole, Globe and Mail: [Columbus'] new film feels curiously outdated. Read more

Jason Anderson, Toronto Star: With its painfully awkward shifts between pat sentimentality, hackneyed teen-movie tropes and parent-baiting raunchiness, there's little to love about I Love You, Beth Cooper. Read more

Anna Smith, Time Out: There's the potential for 'Superbad'-style comedy when Denis and his pal go on the run with Beth and friends, but the pace is slow and lines fall flat thanks to long pauses and hammy delivery. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: The characters lack charm and dimension, falling into stereotypical molds. Joyless scenarios bounce between scenes of driving around town and predictable party mayhem. Read more

Brian Lowry, Variety: Adapted by Larry Doyle from his 2007 novel, I Love You, Beth Cooper peaks early -- like, during the first three minutes -- and rapidly goes downhill from there. Read more

Scott Foundas, Village Voice: [A] joyless, offensively stupid end-of-high-school farce. Read more