Quartile rating: 6.5/10 · 1 rating
Amy, a naive college graduate who believes she's destined to be a great poet, begrudgingly accepts a job at a sex shop while she pursues a mentorship with reclusive writer Rat Billings.
Adult World is a modest but charming coming-of-age indie comedy that benefits from an earnest performance by Emma Roberts and a memorable turn from John Cusack as the sardonic, reluctant mentor Rat Billings. The mentor-worship dynamic gives the film some genuine bite and subverts expectations modestly — Amy's delusions of grandeur are punctured in ways that feel honest rather than cruel. The plot is fairly predictable in structure (naive dreamer gets humbled, grows up), and the cinematography is unremarkable indie-standard. Cusack elevates the material considerably. The ending lands on a satisfying if unspectacular note of earned maturity. Novelty is moderate — the sex-shop setting and Cusack's deadpan deconstruction of literary hero worship give it a distinctive enough flavor without being truly singular.