‘Adventureland’ a rollercoaster

In theaters Friday: All About Steve, Gamer, Extract

New on DVD/Blu-ray: State of Play, Sugar

Fitting that it was released on DVD in August, because Greg Mottola’s Adventureland captures perfectly the long yawn of summer winding down, of hopes ignited and those snuffed out, of school and life and path-altering decisions looming overhead and just days away. Jesse Eisenberg, who was so brilliantly puzzling in Noah Baumbach’s evocative but flawed drama The Squid and the Whale, stars as a recent college graduate dealt a severe financial setback when his father’s demotion at work means no more graduate school unless he can raise the money to pay for it himself.

Eisenberg is a smart kid. He got into Columbia. But now he can’t pay for it, and his lack of social skills and street smarts are put to the test when he is forced to work at a theme park all summer to raise the much-needed cash. The park, a slightly run-down joint filled with old school Tilt-o-Whirls and rollercoasters, ring tosses and bumper cars, is operated by SNL stars Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig, and populated with interesting characters at every ride and carny game. There’s Kristen Stewart’s soft-spoken and trouble-hearted rebel, Martin Starr’s pipe-puffing literature geek, and Ryan Reynolds’ male Chauvanist in rock-n-roll cool clothing.

Eisenberg almost gets knifed over a giant panda prize on his first day, but fortunately things pick up from there. He buddies up with Starr, and, obviously attracted to each other, he and Stewart start dating. The cash flow is slow, but at least it’s coming in.

Like The Squid and the Whale, Adventureland is set in the mid-‘80s to the tunes of Lou Reed, Big Star, INXS and Falco. Like ‘80s comedy king John Hughes, Mottola successfully blends emotional highs and devastations, laughs, romance, youth angst and class envy into a rollercoaster of a drama based in part on his own experiences working at a theme park. At times, Adventureland feels like a true story with snatches of conversation and awkward or exhilarating situations based on real events, or at least Mottola’s memory of them all those years ago. But these details never come across as asides or willful overindulgence. They never overshadow the whole.

Throughout, Eisenberg shakes off those unfair Michael Cera comparisons. In film after film, including Superbad, Cera plays up a Charlie Brown loveable loser persona, but here Eisenberg comes off like a verbose, intellectual East Coast Jewish kid whose insecurities have not yet given way to neuroses. He’s like a dialed-down Woody Allen who still maintains a stronghold of hope for humanity and for himself.

Mottola broke out with 2007’s Superbad, but producer Judd Apatow and goofy sidekick “McLovin” got all the credit for that hit. In July Apatow got serious with his life-threatening illness dramedy Funny People, but Mottola’s Adventureland beat him to it earlier this year. Though filled with Superbad’s vulgarities and plenty of stoner antics, Adventureland is a sophisticated coming of age story about a kid who uses a tough situation to grow up a little bit and decide for himself what kind of life he wants to lead. And it’s definitely worth checking out on DVD.

Also keep an eye out for Paul, Mottola’s upcoming comedy that weds the British comedians behind the brilliant Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz (namely Simon Pegg and Nick Frost) and Apatow players (Seth Rogen and Bill Hader) with a couple of Arrested Development’s Bluth clan (Jason Bateman and Jeffrey Tambor). The film isn’t due till next summer, but a trailer should be right around the corner.