John Green wrote a book not titled The Fault in Our Stars, and unlike last year’s hit, the movie adaptation of Paper Towns is a boring, poorly acted and downright stupid romantic comedy about a friend-zoned schmuck who inadvertently helps his friends get laid while he completely and utterly fails at doing so himself.

Cara Delevingne gets top billing to play Margo, the obnoxious, self-obsessed free spirit who is barely in the movie--but whose sudden disappearance prompts Quentin (Nat Wolff), who has loved her since at least the beginning of the movie, to set off on a scavenger hunt of sorts to find her, neglecting the fact that her best friend Lacey (Halston Sage) is equally attractive, more stable and a lot nicer.

It’s sort of like Goonies only without treasure, bad guys, pirates, likable characters or entertainment value.

At nearly two hours long, Paper Towns feels way too long, though even had it been cut to 90 minutes it still wouldn’t have had enough material to keep it flapping in the wind. And the material is pretty stupid, though arguably worse romantic ideas have been put to screen and more effectively at that. Director Jake Schreier (who made the really good Robot & Frank), sadly, fails to assemble anything remotely representing a movie you’d want to watch. The movie drags and drags and drags, and by the time it starts to resemble anything worth watching, it’s almost over and you don’t care anymore.

I hate to single out Wolff because even Leonardo DiCaprio would have struggled in the role, but Wolff is so underwhelming as the lead protagonist it’s almost impossible not to hate his character for being one of the dumbest pushovers in the history of cinema. None of his on-screen pals were kind enough to slap him upside the head and tell him he’s being a love-drunk idiot, and none of his real pals were polite enough to telling him to avoid this film at all costs, though understandably when you’re a young actor you can’t exactly be picky.

Paper Towns is a dull, dull, dull, dull, dull affair with a stupid story and lame characters, a shocking waste of time for a movie that should be, at its worst, forgettable.

Review by Erik Samdahl.