Nancy Drew

A good half century has passed since I’ve read any Nancy Drew mysteries, an endless series that’s been appearing since 1930, and frankly I wasn’t expecting Andrew Fleming’s ‘Scope movie, written with Tiffany Paulsen, to stir up many memories of them. But this is a loving, uncondescending tribute to the novels’ sweetness and hokeyness and an excellent piece of genre filmmaking. Nancy (Emma Roberts) accompanies her geeky dad (Tate Donovan) to Hollywood, where they rent the former mansion of a late movie star who’s died mysteriously and the girl sleuth solves the case. The postmodernist evocations of the past (roughly the 50s through the 80s) are a charming mishmash, delivered with wit and style. With Josh Flitter and Barry Bostwick. PG, 99 min. (JR)

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