Genius

I must say, I was truly amazed by this movie. I've been puzzled as to why on Earth I bother watching all the Disney Channel movies. After such disappointments like "Can of Worms," "Zenon: Girl of the 21st Century," and the awful "Smart House," to name a few, I didn't think Disney could make a decent TV movie. But here it is! This movie really is genius. Instead of going from cheap comedy and typical overblown plots, Disney made something that is nice and, most importantly, can make this stone-faced critic laugh a lot.

Thirteen-year-old Charlie Boyle is a hockey-loving whiz kid so smart that he has been offered the chance to go to college early, to study, experiment, and even teach. naturally, he has a hard time fitting in with the college students, especially his hockey player roommate, who is in the physics class Charlie teaches. One day, he meets a girl and falls instantly in love, but, always being seen as a nerd and not having much success in the past with such matters, he pretends to be a trouble-maker and enrolls at the junior high the girl attends. Thus begins the fun as Charlie must constantly switch from one identity to the next so his lie is not discovered.

So how did Disney do it? How did they make something funny? Well, the cast is great, especially young Trevor Morgan as Charlie, who has some very clever and quick lines. A script that doesn't fall into embarrassing, unfunny, cliched situations for another, which is so typical for this type of Disney movie. Then again, maybe it was a science experiment they tried with a completely accidental result. If so, then hooray for science! Zanatos's score: 9/10!

This movie is what you would typically expect from Disney. The nerdy kid uses science to help his team win ala Flubber. The strange kid-goes-to-high-school-and-college-at-the-same-time plot was a little hard to buy, but asides from that acceptable. My biggest qualm is that the referee didn't consider anything strange about people flying for long periods of time. Asides from that, it was good. The actors, especially Emmy Rossum (Claire), saved this movie from a worse rating. They took what could have been a bad script and made it seem realistic. The writer owes them a debt of gratitude.

Disney continues to garner praise for family films, this time for "Genius", a well-conceived, well-paced, delightful comedy with a talented cast. Essentially, this is a story about growing up and feeling the need to belong-- with a twist of slapstick, mistaken identity, college hockey and a particle beam accelerator. Quite an accomplishment.

In the tradition of Merlin Jones--probably Disney's most famous teen genius (see The Monkey's Uncle and The Misadventures of Merlin Jones)--we meet Charlie Boyle, our hero, obsessed with hockey, physics, and fitting in. Trevor Morgan is wonderful in this dual role as Charlie/Chaz...he has a lot of presence for a kid his age, and a lot of promise. Emmy Rossum is very charming and natural as Claire Addison--sweet and tomboyish, she lends a little romance to story. The always incomparable Charles Fleischer is featured as Dr. Krickstein, giving a great performance as Charlie's hero, mentor and friend, and showing of his rollerblading skills in the process...

I'd love to see Disney team up Charlie, Claire and Dr. Krickstein again...there's endless adventure potential here! Take advantage of it!

I watched Genius , reliving my memories! Trevor Morgan was perfect for the role of Charlie. He had looks, charm, personality, wit and ha stealth at times just being so darn sneaky :)

But then you have his Genius side, his most perfect side, like it was made for him. I was so inspired by the movie that I instantly started looking up "Swiss" from 1997 of splitting the photon, and also "Eureka" and seeing if that was tied with Archimedes where The Doc explained where you could be not able to solve something, take your mind off it, than BAMB! Eureka! It hits you.

So I wanted to see if those facts were true, also the part with defying gravity like they did with microchips of some kind...where one does the others would be force to do. I know it's Disney and its a movie, but often times if they do their research, I'd like to think they got the science right. It's like Ice Princess when Casey was doing Physics...I heard she got most of the calculation wrong..if so, what part did they miss..it's a tricky subject, but I'd like to know more, and this movie and Ice Princess has opened my eyes to further exploration. Perfect movie and a joy to watch...by the way...Claire's skating is magnificent lol.

Alot of made for TV Disney Channel movies drip with so much sweet, over the top, ewww and gooo, you just don't want to watch them anymore. This was wasn't like that. Clever script, cleverly acted--this movie is by far one of TDC's better movies. Like Luck of the Irish, Smart House, or The Jett Jackson Movie. They are well made, well acted and aren't overly boring.

Trevor MOrgan is excellent as the "genius" playing both Chaz and charlie brilliantly. He is certainly making a man for himself...big movies under his belt will only help this talented 15 year old!

8 out of 10