Valentine’s Weekend. To my mind, bar none, the biggest, money-making, cut throat opening weekends of the year in cinemas worldwide. This weekend: Wolfman, brings Victorianism to our screens, and an extra hairy Benicio DelToro to our hearts. Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief which barely even makes grammatical sense, and Valentine’s Day the least subtle answer to the ‘Why should I see this movie’ question since the glass basement floor smashing hit Date Movie (I got free tickets to see Date Movie, with coupons for free drinks and popcorn, and I still felt like I’d been cheated).

Whilst a list of some of this week’s DVD releases is even more blatant… The Time Traveller’s Wife, Couples Retreat, and The Stepfather, but hopefully they haven’t realised the irony behind releasing a film about a Stepfather the week before Valentine’s day… But then, they’re Americans, why would they?

Also out this week (but not on the ‘This Week on DVD’ list, thank you Google!) is Adventureland. Mayhaps not a 100% ‘dead cert’, Bridget Jones of a rom-com with a bit of ‘Coming of Age’ thrown on to the tilt-a-whirl for good measure. Starring Jesse Eisenberg (the new Michael Cera), as the nerdy booksmart geek-o-rama, hell bent on Ivy League, but forced to work as a carnie for a summer to earn the tuition. This I never understood. I’m under the impression that without some sort of financial help, Ivy League schooling can run into tens of thousands of dollars a semester at least. How much can you really earn from a shit fairground job in a couple of months? $60,000? When do I start?).

As well as the coming of age ‘Oh I thought I needed money and a good school to get ahead in this world, but now I realise life’s not all about money and school, but also about friends, dicking around in a shit job you hate, and smoking weed’ aspect – Good message by the way, there’s also a rom-com feel as Eisenberg quite fancies one of his co-workers.

Even though he’s supposed to be a geeky, socially awkward dilbert, he finds to his surprise that all of a sudden he’s top man on campus, with his pick of the chicks. He can’t believe his luck, but it’s pretty believable to you and me. First of all, Eisenberg just can’t play a nerd. He’s an actor, but not a good enough one to act his way out of acting (and looking) like an actor. He’s too confident. His speech, his looks, his body language none of it’s awkward enough. He’s Jewish (obviously), and looks it, but it’s not Woody Allen Jewish, it’s Matt Stone (South Park), he makes it work. And he shouldn’t.

The film trundles along nicely. He gets into a bit of a mess, has to sort it out, then learns a valuable lesson by the end. Although he does learn something, I wouldn’t say his character changes throughout really at all. Despite being in my opinion, a pretty cool guy all the way through (but then I’m a nerd myself), it’s not like we don’t identify with him. Yet we don’t care for him. He’s too cool to seem to care that much for himself, and so why should we.

It’s quite a good medium ground, somewhere in between romantic-for-the-ladies-comedy with the ‘Nice Guy’ making mistakes, but being all cute and charming and getting the girl, and actual comedy with some cock gags punched in.

If Adventureland promises anything to the young male in Blockbuster, stood before it this weekend, it is this. When his Mrs. turns to him, trying to interrupt the film experience with a quick smooch… it won’t be half through a car chase, he won’t get pissed off, and his night won’t end with a long cold, lonely walk back to his flat.