An underrated little picture, Real Genius offers a rare college comedy that doesn't rely on gross-out humour as well as a look at Val Kilmer before he turned into a star. A high school whiz kid (Gabriel Jarret) arrives at a brainy college, where the crème de la crème of the science students are marshalled under an ambitious professor (expert villain William Atherton). Unbeknown to them, the kids are working on a weapons system that the prof. plans on selling to the government. The star student and chief rabble-rouser is played by Kilmer, in good early form as a cocky genius who hasn't lost touch with his goofy side. The director is Martha Coolidge, whose Valley Girl was one of the brightest (and most unexpected) of 1980s comedies; she keeps the movie perking along and never worries about dumbing down a film that just happens to be about smart people. --Robert Horton