Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist (PG-13, 2008)

Nick (Michael Cera) is a sensitive high school senior who plays bass in a band, drives a beloved Yugo, and burns soul-baring compilation CDs for his ex-girlfriend Tris (Alexis Dziena). One night, Nick meets Tris' classmate Norah (Kat Dennings), a fellow indie rock lover, after a gig in Manhattan. The two instantly bond over their devotion to the fictional band Where's Fluffy, which is supposed to play at an undisclosed location in the city. While Nick and Norah search every possible club and bar for Fluffy, Nick's bandmates agree to drive Norah's drunk best friend home to New Jersey. What ensues is like Where's Waldo? meets Before Sunrise.

Director Peter Sollett infuses the film -- based on a young-adult novel by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan -- with the staples of most romantic comedies: the meet cute, a night out in New York City, comic-relief best friends, witty banter, and even a gross-out gag or two. And while the two protagonists -- especially go-to adolescent lead Cera -- are believable as hip-but-shy, sensitive-but-worldly, city-savvy-but-suburban-dwelling teens, parts of the film lag, get bogged down by the drunk-friend subplot, and just aren't as funny as the filmmakers intended.

What does work is the movie's vision of MySpace-generation teens as candid and tolerant. The teen culture in the film includes ubiquitous use of technology, gay and straight best friends, a rich record-company heiress who falls for a guy who drives a Yugo, girls who wear private school skirts by day and sexy mini skirts by night. This is the world that 21st-century teens live in, even if only a tiny fraction of them use New York's post-punk clubs and greasy spoons as their playground.