Real Genius 1985

Janet Maslin, New York Times: What the film needs, instead of these familiar teen-movie trappings, is a cleverness and eccentricity to match that of its characters. For the most part, these are qualities that it lacks. Read more

Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader: The humor is relentlessly cruel, smug, and disconnected from any sense of how human beings might behave in similar situations. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: Real Genius contains many pleasures, but one of the best is its conviction that the American campus contains life as we know it. Read more

Geoff Andrew, Time Out: It does make you wonder if the drive of the US education system is ultimately to develop better weapons of mass-destruction, though Coolidge's movie is too hazily good-natured to capitalise on the tougher aspects of the material. Read more

Variety: What lifts the production above the run-of-the-mill is swift direction by Martha Coolidge, who has a firm grasp over the manic material. Read more