MOVIE REVIEW : Nostalgic ‘Book of Love’ Gets the ‘50s Down Pat

Most nostalgic teen movies set in the ‘50s are about as superficial as the latest chain of soda fountains with repro neon clocks and golden oldies on the jukebox. But “Book of Love” (citywide) has all the moves down pat.

It’s not that those of us who actually went to high school in the ‘50s necessarily had such a mythically typical experience as this film’s likably all-American small-town hero (Chris Young), but that William Kotzwinkle’s adaptation of his own novel rings true in the attitudes and behavior of the so-called silent generation.

Since this is a comedy, there is naturally some exaggeration, yet the film’s funny moments are not merely inspired but credible. Right at the start, Robert Shaye, founder of New Line Cinema in his directorial debut, sets the film’s good-natured, compassionately observant tone. You have to hope that a film so devoid of cruelty and violence will find its audience.

Young’s Jack Twiller is the new boy in a small Pennsylvania city. His bland good looks make him the ideal white-bread Everyteen, a nice, decent middle-class kid who is shy and uncertain and a bit scrawny but sure to win the prettiest girl in his class, Lily (Josie Bissett), away from macho football star Angelo (Beau Dremann, an actor of wit and presence).

Jack is smart but not a very good student (that would be unmasculine, uncool) and thinks he might become a writer. The one person who sees something special in him--she may in fact be merely being kind or encouraging--is Gina (Tricia Leigh Fisher), who is Italian-American, qualifying as exotic in Jack’s world.

Fisher moves to the center of the film very gradually but when she arrives, she walks away with it. A dark, witty beauty with a direct gaze, Fisher shows us both the smarts and the vulnerability behind Gina’s ain’ts and dropped g’s .

In the course of Jack’s senior year (class of ‘56), he has his first encounters with the opposite sex and with alcohol. He also sees “East of Eden,” a watershed experience for ‘50s kids along with “Rebel Without a Cause,” and this prompts the film’s most inspired moment: Jack’s earnest, unintentionally hilarious emulation of the moody James Dean in pursuit of a perplexed Lily.

Details and nuances are crucial in this kind of film, and it is filled with telling touches. There is a lovely moment when Jack’s bright prepubescent brother (Aeryk Egan), after watching his first carnival stripper, approaches her for an autograph, and this seasoned lady responds with kindness. Also, the film gets beyond Angelo’s stereotypical bully image to show him as not such a bad guy after all. Then there is Jack’s sly friend, Floyd, played mischievously by John Cameron Mitchell, who can get away with anything because he has such good manners in dealing with adults.

For the benefit of audiences of Jack’s generation there’s a fanciful framing story that suggests that, by golly, if you reach back to your youthful dreams you just may get a second chance at them. Of course “Book of Love” (rated PG-13 for mildly risque language and situations) is sentimental, and unashamedly so, just like so many of the send-’em-home happy movies of its era.

‘Book of Love’

Chris Young: Jack Twiller

Keith Coogan: Crutch Kane

Aeryk Egan: Peanut

Josie Bissett: Lily

Tricia Leigh: Fisher Gina

Danny Nucci: Spider

John Cameron: Mitchell Floyd

Beau Dremann: Angelo

A New Line Cinema presentation. Director Robert Shaye. Producer Rachel Talalay. Executive producer Sara Risher. Screenplay by William Kotzwinkle; based on his novel “Jack in the Box.” Cinematographer Peter Deming. Editor Terry Stokes. Costumes Susie Desanto. Music supervisor Bonnie Greenberg. Production design C.J. Strawn. Art director Timothy Gray. Set decorator James Barrows. Sound Jim Thornton.

Running time: 1 hour, 33 minutes.

MPAA-rated: PG-13 (for mildly risque language and situations).