By the time I realized I needed to see The Perks of Being a Wallflower, I was knee deep in late-year Oscar films and it just got pushed down in my queue.  Flash forward to me and my mother on a Delta flight to Tel Aviv Tuesday night nestles in our little pods finally watching Stephen Chbosky’s movie.  I had heard it was a really good script, but was completely unprepared for my reaction to it, which was fairly intense, especially for an airplane.  Why do I always end up crying on airplanes?

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is not a teen movie, it’s a really great movie about teenagers.  There’s a difference.  Even my mother, ever the critic, stuck her head over the pod with puffy, tear-stained eyes and said “that was a really good script.”  Perhaps more than any film I’ve ever seen, Perks captured the connection I felt in high school with my merry band of outsiders, people like Carol Nolte, Sandy Udell, and my boyfriend Steven Stern.  Perks told my story.  Here’s the line that really turned on the water works for me:

Having now having seen every major film released last year, I can say with confidence that The Perks of Being a Wallflower should have at least gotten a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar nomination, probably over Life of Pi.  If you haven’t already, make sure you see The Perks of Being a Wallflower, because we accept the films we think we deserve.