If you're hungry to see a romantic comedy about a genetically and culturally imbalanced geek-meets-babe relationship that makes the one in Knocked Up look like the quintessence of plausible human mating, then by all means subject yourself to the one-joke sub–Judd Apatow snark-athon that is She's Out of My League. Kirk (Jay Baruchel), a boyish, awkward dork, has a nervous, fumbling manner, a chest as flat as an ironing board, and a voice that's a honking, sniveling irritant; he's like the son of Gilbert Gottfried crossed with a depressed snail. Molly (Alice Eve), who's gorgeous, pert, shapely, intelligent, and free of any nasty or judgmental thoughts, is like Ann-Margret playing a very liberal nun. She is, in other words, the film's adolescent fantasy of what a ''perfect'' girl should be. 
 
 Taken as a purely sexual object (which the movie keeps pretending she's not), Alice certainly is out of Kirk's league. Yet when they start to date, their disjunction in looks isn't what's so far-fetched. It's that he's a socially inept underachiever who works in airport security, and she's a high-end event planner who oozes poise and would never be drawn to such a gawky, shambling loser. Love may well conquer class divisions, but not when there's absolutely nothing in it for the half of the couple who's dating down. 
 
 She's Out of My League is eager to be a latter-day Woody Allen/Revenge of the Nerds fairy tale of hormonal wish fulfillment, in which a ''funny'' guy with quick-witted neurotic charm triumphs over the fact that he doesn't look like a stud-muffin. The trouble is, no one remembered to make Kirk charming! Jay Baruchel just plays him as a stammering arrested-development case and glutton for punishment. There are moments when his misery yields some comedy: I laughed out loud at Kirk's tortured explanation to Molly about why he couldn't stand up to shake her father's hand. (Imagine an untimely-boner joke, only twice as embarrassing.) And at least Kirk's Apatow-lite circle of jerky friends (led by T.J. Miller as an entertainingly blunt horndog) offer the movie a few trash-talking breaks. When they really got going, I forgot that Kirk was even there. C 
 
 See all of this week's reviews ||||| Who can relate to a nerd who dreams of rubbing his pencil dick on the private parts of a blonde hot enough to rate a hard 10? My guess is that audience is pathetically large, which should chart She's Out of My League high as a date-movie must for the loser in all of us. OK, you've seen it before. Lots. Maybe when it was called 10 or Can't Buy Me Love or Can't Hardly Wait or Knocked Up or Superbad or anything with Michael Cera. Stop me before I name-check again. She's Out of My League is a rowdy blast because the spiky young cast treats the played-out script like virgin territory. That's acting! 
 
 Peter Travers reviews She's Out of My League in his weekly video podcast, "At the Movies With Peter Travers." 
 
 Jay Baruchel, the skinny Canadian actor who scored in Tropic Thunder, is appealingly funny as Kirk Kettner, a dweeb working Pittsburgh airport security (a job Hollywood hasn't yet exhausted). When bodacious event planner Molly (a sparkling Alice Eve) wafts by Kirk, he is struck by the scent of the unattainable. Then she calls him. Don't even think that I'm telling you why. 
 
 Get more news, reviews and interviews from Peter Travers on The Travers Take. 
 
 The party spirit of this movie, directed by newcomer Jim Field Smith, comes through best when Kirk just hangs with his airport buds — chubby Devon (Nate Torrence), studly Jack (Mike Vogel) and the wild-eyed Stainer (a deadpan-hilarious T.J. Miller). Everything that happens to Kirk is fodder for their brutal comic analysis. That includes Kirk splooging in his pants at Molly's first touch and the decision to have Devon shave Kirk's pubes (how is that not gay?) because, as Jack advises, it's a look that says to Molly, "Hey, you can put your mouth there.' " Them's the jokes, folks, and you'll laugh more times than not because this R-rated blend of the sweet and the raunchy has its heart in the right place. ||||| She's Out of My League 
 
 March 10, 2010 
 
 Cast & Credits Kirk Jay Baruchel 
 
 Molly Alice Eve 
 
 Stainer T.J. Miller 
 
 Jack Mike Vogel 
 
 Devon Nate Torrence 
 
 Marnie Lindsay Sloane 
 
 Dylan Kyle Bornheimer 
 
 Mrs. Kettner Debra Jo Rupp 
 
 Mr. Kettner Adam LeFevre 
 
 
 
 Paramount presents a film directed by Jim Field Smith. Written by Sean Anders and John Morris. Running time: 106 minutes. Rated R (for language and sexual content). Printer-friendly » 
 
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 Molly is a perfect 10. Kirk is a five. This scoring is provided by his best friends, who sadly inform him, "You can't jump more than two." Because of reasoning like that, Aristotle Onassis remains a hero to fours and fives everywhere. "She's Out of My League," which is sort of a good comedy, tells the story of a five who meets a 10 who believes there is a 10 inside of him fighting to get out. 
 
 Kirk (Jay Baruchel) works as a TSA security screener at the Pittsburgh airport. He's competent enough, but the behavior of his colleagues should all by itself raise the national security level to red. Apparently unsupervised, they brighten up their jobs by trying to pick up every cute girl who comes through security. This is made more possible because there never seem to be 500 impatient passengers waiting in line. 
 
 
 
 Baruchel looks as if he could indeed be a five, but he has that essential quality of turning into a 10 with his attitude alone. Here he will find what I have long observed, that everyone is beautiful when they're looking at you with love in their eyes. Kirk has recently become the victim of the sort of perfect storm that strikes the heroes of movies like this. His girlfriend Marnie (Lindsay Sloane) has broken up with him. But having lacked a warm family relationship, she latched onto Kirk's family, and now hangs out at his house with her new boyfriend, who Kirk's parents approve of. Think about that. 
 
 
 
 Molly (Alice Eve) is also fresh from romantic disaster. When she loses her iPhone and Kirk finds it and returns it, she asks him out to dinner. He's stunned, because, yes, she's out of his league. But it turns out Molly is ready to play in a different league, one where being a 10 on the outside is less important than being a 10 on the inside. Kirk's innate decency melts her heart. 
 
 
 
 Jay Baruchel has that quality of seeming like someone we might actually have known outside of a movie. He plays Kirk as apologetic, easily embarrassed, with low self-esteem -- plain and simple, a nice guy. Alice Eve, who is despite all evidence British, is pretty, yes, but not actually quite a 10. A 9.5, easy. Isn't that scoring system loathsome? Her best friend, Patty (Krysten Ritter), thinks that Kirk is beneath Molly, possibly because Patty likes to bask in the reflected glow of Molly's tenhood. Kirk's own three best buddies include two party animals and one nice pudgy guy, whose combined wisdom on women is a perfect two. 
 
 
 
 There are some funny set pieces here, one involving guys rummaging through each other's netherlands, one involving a family trip to Branson, Mo., in matching sweatshirts. Do you ever get the feeling you're the last American alive who hasn't been to Branson? That Titanic attraction sounds great to me. Anyway, much depends on whether Kirk will actually make this journey. 
 
 
 
 The movie is not a comedy classic. But in a genre where so many movies struggle to lift themselves from zero to one, it's about, oh, a six point five. ||||| I like Jay Baruchel. He's the 21st century Don Knotts , and even in a forgettable film like "She's Out of My League" — its title alone secures it a place in film history alongside "She's All That" and "She's Out of Control" — Baruchel's adenoidal, sidewinding line readings, which are exact verbal corollaries to his zigzaggy eyebrows, can make the stupidest material sound temporarily funny.Only for a moment, though, as the old song goes, then the moment's gone. I laughed here and there at "She's Out of My League," but I sort of hated everything it had to say about nerds and babes and the sliding scale of self-image. Half the film takes place in a Judd Apatow comedy , or tries to (in "Knocked Up," which is infinitely wittier, Baruchel was Seth Rogen 's pal who mewls, "I shouldn't have gone in there …" at the hospital). The other half takes place in a very drably photographed Pittsburgh, where Kirk (Baruchel) works the airport with his pals as a Transportation Security Administration employee."She kissed you? On purpose?" Kirk's friend asks him, after the lawyer-turned-events-planner played by Alice Eve makes her interest known. Molly's coming off a bad relationship to a good-looking, untrustworthy fellow; this, we're told, is why she's willing to give Kirk a try. His friends freak out; Kirk's coarse-grained, Branson-loving family ogle and paw her over dinner. She remains supernaturally sunny about it all, while Kirk's discomfort levels exceed those set by early Ben Stiller comedies, which is saying something.The movie exists for its set pieces involving ejaculation and the like. Molly exists to fulfill a male fantasy, blankly. She's a mirage of a character. (If this were "Alice in Wonderland," she'd be the Cheshire Cleavage.) The nerd gets the babe, but the film, directed by Jim Field Smith, is both verbally and visually flat. Rather than this high-concept and very likely profitable affair, I'd rather see a lower-concept comedy about two people who can't be pigeonholed quite so easily.MPAA rating:R (for language and sexual content)Cast:Jay Baruchel (Kirk); Alice Eve (Molly); T.J. Miller (Stainer); Mike Vogel (Jack); Nate Torrence (Devon); Lindsay Sloane (Marnie)Credits:Directed by Jim Field Smith; written by Sean Anders and John Morris; produced by Jimmy Miller and David Householter. A DreamWorks Pictures release. Running time: 1:46.Nerds, triumphant"Beauty and the Beast" (1991):Belle shuns the handsome, insensitive Gaston for the inwardly beautiful Beast."Revenge of the Nerds" (1984):A college's social rejects fight for self-respect and end up with sorority girls as well."Sixteen Candles" (1984):Freshman geek ( Anthony Michael Hall ) pursues a sophomore ( Molly Ringwald ) but wakes up with a beautiful senior."Bringing Up Baby" (1938): Cary Grant dons glasses to nerd it up as a paleontologist, engaged but in a loveless relationship, who is pursued by a madcap socialite ( Katharine Hepburn )."The Nutty Professor" (1963):In the original version, Jerry Lewis is a professor who becomes suave (and obnoxious) thanks to a potion.
– You could do better than She’s Out of My League, the latest romantic comedy about a hot girl dating a dweeb. But some critics give it a passing grade. Here’s what they’re saying. “If you're hungry to see a romantic comedy that makes Knocked Up look like the quintessence of plausible human mating, then by all means subject yourself” to this “one-joke sub-Judd Apatow snark-athon,” writes Owen Gleiberman of EW. There’s simply nothing remotely datable about Jay Baruchel’s male lead. “I laughed here and there,” says Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune. “But I kind of hated everything it had to say.” Alice Eve’s character in particular is just a male fantasy. “If this were "Alice in Wonderland," she'd be the Cheshire Cleavage.” But Roger Ebert liked it OK. “It’s not a comedy classic,” he admits. “But in a genre where so many movies struggle to lift themselves from zero to one, it's about, oh, a six point five.” Peter Travers of Rolling Stone agrees. Sure, you’ve seen this a hundred times before, but “the spiky young cast treats the played-out script like virgin territory. That’s acting!”