Check Out the Trailer

Having been based on Jeff Kinney’s young adult book, which was based on a collection of comic strips, I wondered how the film would work as a feature film. With its stream of consciousness style, the book doesn’t have the narrative structure that a feature would need to sustain momentum. But with a few tweaks to the original text, the film finds a focus, giving Kinney’s keen middle school observations even more punch.

Greg Heffley (Zachary Gordon, THE BROTHERS BLOOM) is about to start middle school and his anxiety is growing by the minute. He believes it is the dumbest idea ever invented because it mixes kids who haven’t hit their growth spurt like him with gorillas who have to shave their bodies twice daily. He worries about saying or doing the wrong thing. Making matters worse is his best friend Rowley (Robert Capron, THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE), who still plays with toys, listens to boy bands and is completely oblivious to the rules of tweendom. His older brother Rodrick (Devon Bostick, LAND OF THE DEAD), a high schooler in a band called Löded Diper, puts the fear into him by saying he won’t even survive his first day.
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