Review of The Education of Charlie Banks (2007) by Aidan H — 07 Jun 2009

I remember reading On The Road and being more interested by the exploits of real man adventurer Neal Cassidy than the guilt-tripping Catholic fuzz-butt Keroac. I feel similarly about this movie. The audience is supposed to empathise with whiny, liberal virgin Banks and Durst needlessly manipulates this with a purposely one-dimensional direction of Mike, the urban savage's character and some rich kid stereotyping.

Beyond the social morality lesson, most of the action takes place off screen except for a couple of effectively-staged punch-ups but, despite all this, I enjoyed this film, made all the more watchable for the animal presence of Ritter who ably conveyed the physical threat his character was intended to portray.