One would have to return to the 1980s and teen movies Risky Business and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off to find a youth comedy that hits the G-spot quite like producer Judd Apatow’s Superbad. After writing and directing hits The 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up, Apatow hands the writing reins to his Knocked Up star Seth Rogen, who, together with co-writer Evan Goldberg, has constructed an autobiographical teen fantasy which manages to be outrageously rude and crude, yet somehow remains both sophisticated and compassionate in its consideration of what makes teenagers tick.

What makes Superbad super good? The premise is hardly original — nerdy teenagers Evan (Michael Cera), Seth (Jonah Hill) and Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) have a crazy night of adventures after their attempt to buy alcohol illegally goes disastrously wrong. The boys are closely bonded by their desire to get laid, while increasingly aware that the intrusion of girls into their hermetically sealed world of sexual longing potentially spells the end of their friendship.

As well as eliciting fluent performances from his cast, director Greg 'The Daytrippers' Mottola deftly switches the narrative between the boy’s quest for integration and Fogell’s misguided attempts to convince that he’s a man of the world. The Rabelaisian dictates (the word ‘fuck’ is used 186 times) conceal a wistful valentine to the innocent values of childhood friendship. A pubescent hoot.