One of my favourite fictional characters is Ignatius J. Reilly, the pretentious and preening adolescent narrator of John Kennedy Toole’s tragi-comic novel A Confederacy of Dunces. He’s distinguished by his literary ambitions, and with it a hi-falutin’ vocabulary and lofty self-regard. I bring Ignatius up having seen Youth in Revolt, which treads in its footsteps somewhat, and too has its origins in a novel — one of the same name by C.D. Payne.

The protagonist is Nick Twisp, a teenager similarly affected by notions of being a writer, who has seemingly swallowed a thesaurus, and is burdened by his troublesome virginity. Played to perfection by Michael Cera, who has done the awkward adolescent thing to good effect before in Superbad, and directed by Miguel Agerta, who was responsible for the sublimely uncomfortable Chuck & Buck, it hits the beats you sort of expect an indie comedy to reach for, sometimes with panache.

The story’s twist, the aspect which raises it above the level it starts at, is the protagonist’s realisation that he needs to develop a bad boy persona to attract the delectable Sheeni Saunders. She is a bit of a teenage pseud, like Nick himself, and her idea of a suitable suitor is Belmondo, the archetype of French New Wave cool featured in Truffaut’s Breathless. (Belmondo in turn modeled himself on Humphrey Bogart, but being French adds an extra dimension of cool in Sheeni’s eyes.) Anyway, Nick’s back-up personality pops up to give him advice at opportune moments, all the while smoking a cigarette and sporting a moustache.

Seeing this alternate self, named Francois Dillinger, egg Nick Wisp on to acts of daring and trouble making is one of the chief pleasures of this very likeable film. A lot of the glee is down to Cera’s strong performances as Nick and Francois — the two are clearly delineated. Other roles are equally well cast: Nick’s dad is an interestingly cast Steve Buscemi, and Sheeni’s brother and parents are strong too.

So, if we’ve got good actors in a comedy with a novel element, how come I don’t like Youth in Revolt more than I do? I suspect the answers are in the source material — perhaps a firmer hand could have been taken with Gustin Nash’s screenplay. For instance, having shifted location from Berkeley to a backwoods town where his mum’s lowlife lover has access to a mobile home, we then shift again when Sheeni is despatched to a school where it’s all French all the time. That sort of thing works better on paper than on screen: location is part of a film’s lifeblood, and to suddenly shift seems irksome. The director tries to make light of the fact by doing the journey to the school in animated form, and it’s kind of cute, but to me emphasises structural failings.

There’s another issue too. It’s not just Nick Wisp and Sheeni that have an affected manner. Pretty much all the younger characters do, and it’s a routine that wears thin, all of them talking in a stilted fashion and having similar issues. Sure, adolescents have a lot in common — but one of those things is a desire to be perceived as individual, and these kids all come from the same mould. It’s a pretty old mould at that, revolving around dreams of travelling to Europe, arthouse cinema, and cult vinyl — likely the stuff of C.D. Payne’s youth, but not credibly that of teenagers in today’s world, with which they seem to have no reference points. No, I’m not asking for topicality, but some recognition of contemporary youth styles and issues would have been welcome.

Really though, these are small quibbles about a film that is largely very satisfying. I’m not sure that I’ll ever read the book that it’s based on, but if it’s reminded me of A Confederacy of Dunces then it’s performed a useful service regardless.