Bold, beleaguered youngsters

FROM LEFT: Olivia Cooke, Thomas Mann and Ronald Cyler II

‘Me and Earl and the Dying Girl’: Affection and affliction

Painfully genuine and relatable, the teen comedy-drama “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” is based on the book by Jesse Andrews, centering on an artist and his friendship with a leukemia-stricken girl from school.

Andrews is also on board as screenwriter, just like author Stephen Chbosky was for “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” the faithfulness to the source also benefiting this film. And, much like “Perks,” this coming-of-age sojourn-and-illness drama is an effective tearjerker that staggers in its starkness and authenticity.

The Alfonso Gomez-Rejon film creatively presents the reluctant friendship between aspiring filmmaker Greg (Thomas Mann) and sick girl Rachel (Olivia Cooke), whose once-hesitant bond evolves organically. He makes and stars in films with his childhood friend—whom he considers a mere “coworker”—Earl (Ronald Cyler II).

Mann, as the self-hating, low-key teen, has a Paul Dano-ish vibe, “adorkable” and unassuming—while Cooke complementingly plays a sick girl again (after her role in “Bates Motel”), whose hopelessness can be felt through the few times she gets to really express herself. Nick Offerman, as Greg’s culture-loving, quirky dad, steals almost every scene he’s in.

The film might leave one a sobbing mess, a testament to its tight script and acting, but it’s a good cry—an understandably cathartic response, nonetheless.

‘Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials’: Wicked game, redux

Dylan O’Brien returns as the defiant Thomas, leader of young survivors in a postapocalyptic world in the sequel to the 2014 science fiction flick “Maze Runner.”

The Wes Ball film loses no time in establishing a similarly chaotic realm in the solid second film of the trilogy, bringing Thomas face-to-face with horrors outside the maze where he and his fellow teens were trapped in and analyzed.

“Scorch Trials” succeeds in fleshing out the world where youngsters are put to the most grueling of tests by sinister figures in authority, for reasons that are further revealed in this installment.

It does, however, remind viewers of others of its young adult ilk—it often looks, feels, and sounds like “The Hunger Games” and “Divergent” films, in that its beleaguered young people keep running from abusive adults in power, and they revolt to end such despotic systems.

There are more characters, but the most prominent addition is Aidan Gillen, who is almost as smarmy as his popular “Game of Thrones” character.

The revelation that one of the characters is a turncoat works as   the impetus for the finale “Death Cure,” to be released in 2017.