The Cake Eaters

Loaded with potentially maudlin material, Mary Stuart Masterson’s directorial debut turns out to be an economical, affecting slice of small-town naturalism. Suffering from a neuromuscular disease and unsure how much time she has left, 15-year-old Georgia (Twilight’s Stewart) determines to lose her virginity to the socially inept Beagle (Stanford), a cafeteria worker at her high school. The Cake Eaters hits a lot of familiar notes—timing is everything, happiness is fleeting, etc.—but the movie is not without its share of old-fashioned cinematic virtues.