Parents' Guide to Boy Genius

This child-prodigy comedy is familiar and funny enough to amuse younger viewers but doesn't stand out quite as much as its main character does. Brown's precocious Emmett and Wilson's eccentric Mary have a charming intergenerational friendship as they attempt to use her true-crime know-how and his super intelligence to find the real thief. There's a particularly funny moment when Mary barges into a high school party and plays Naughty by Nature's "Hip Hop Hooray" to give Emmett more time to investigate a classmate's bedroom. There aren't enough movies about multigenerational friendships, so it's nice to see Emmett learning from Mary.

Although Boy Genius' plot is rather thin, the filmmakers do include a few surprisingly substantive conversations and themes in the story. It's revealed that Emmett and Luke's dead father, who was also incredibly intelligent, had a mental illness, and Emmett worries, relatably, that he'll follow in his father's footsteps. The script falters in its preoccupation with Emmett's crush (for someone who's such a prodigy, it seems rather immature that he thinks a 16- or 17-year-old could return his affection), and the resolution of the crime investigation ends up feeling a bit anticlimactic. But for tweens, it's an entertaining pick with a charming cast.