Nebraskan native Adam Rehmeier returns to suburbia in raunchy form with the easily appeasable Snack Shack. The premise of two fast and loose teenage boys working at a poolside concession stand seems like it’s primed to be the Project X of summer vacation, but the film’s disguised coming-of-age might be in tune to the seasonal transitional period between schools, friendships that evolve or disintegrate outside of coordinated class schedules, and homecomings of those who return with advice from a different life.

The setting: Nebraska City, summer of 1991. Ruling in their respective fields, Terminator 2 and “Good Vibrations” may have informed the upper-body masses of some of the featured high school students. But removed from pop culture influences are our two leads AJ (Conor Sherry) and Moose (Gabriel LaBelle, trading a Super 8 for a homemade brewski in perpetual possession), who are frenzied by ideas of extreme profit (“Don’t waste your time with that entry-level slop,” Moose says, somewhat parroting a sleazy business coach in some scenes). Their get-money schemes often land them in trouble, to the reasonable dismay of AJ’s parents (considering that AJ’s father is the town judge). The latest endeavor, in which AJ withdraws money from his college fund to rent a dilapidated shack for the summer, puts them deep in the financial red. Furthermore, AJ’s future is threatened with the prospective enrollment of military school, pinning a bigger cloud in the Midwestern summer sky.

Rehmeier’s ode to survival in the suburban drone delightfully excelled in 2020’s punk rom-com Dinner in America, so much so that even a hardened cynic might believe in finding love in a hopeless place. Romance also springs up in Snack Shack when army brat Brooke (Mika Abdalla) rolls into the neighborhood. However, her role as the older-neighbor crush leaves a stupefied AJ on unstable footing for most of the film, which then centers their development around AJ’s voyage: his sneezy flukes, simple misunderstandings, and inability to express basic communication as a teenage boy. You might pity AJ in his attempts to get his shit together, but you’re less likely to root for this relationship by the end than for Dinner in America‘s two most unlikely contenders for falling in love.

Most of the entertainment dwells in the bro-hood between AJ and Moose (which becomes more apparent when the film loses a bit of light once their friendship hits a wall). The dialogue is a few degrees shy of the provocative vile spewed by Rehmeier’s previous film characters, but finds welcoming hosts in our two floppy-haired boys constantly hitching up their big boy pants and fist-fighting each other in every other take. “Shitpig” is a hollowed term of endearment and “fuckdogs” are a ruse for a quick forgettable laugh, but Rehmeier’s writing keeps you on the edge of your seat, doing its best to avoid staleness. Sherry’s pale twig-physicality is game for slapstick shenanigans and LaBelle stretches his dudeness to new heights following the timid genius-boy of The Fabelmans, but I found Nick Robinson’s portrayal of Shane, an older family friend who returns from the military, to be poignant. As an actor who has played all kinds of teenage boy role under the Hollywood sun, Robinson playing a solemn character who is in between boy and adult — drinking to forget, aching for an answer in listless adventures — is a beacon of the life that comes after the coming-of-age. Shane guides AJ to the foundational points of human connection as teenage boys are wont to evade, but he himself resembles an empty shell of something that was left behind during his service. If given the chance, I would choose to forgo Brooke as the disruptor and push for Shane’s quiet uncertainty to leave AJ questioning about his choices in life.

However, mass-appeal sincerity may not be at the forefront of Snack Shack‘s path. The film is semi-autographical and leans towards a retrospective confrontation of growing pains in all awkwardness. But whether I relate to financial ambition or karate-chopping at my best friend’s neck for shits and giggles, it’d be immature of me to pretend to be above some of Snack Shack‘s charm.

Opens Friday, 3/15 @ AMC Boston Common