By

Please Stand By

For the Fanning club

Dakota Fanning checks off the Rain Man box on her filmography with this portrayal of an autistic young lady in San Francisco who ditches her caregiver (Toni Collette, excellent as always) and makes her frightening way to Los Angeles to hand-deliver her submission to a Star Trek scriptwriting contest. While it’s good to see cinematic attempts to focus on an individual rather than a disease, the direction’s a bit flat and the uplifting ending preordained. Fanning is certainly committed to the role, but too often falls back on mere tics and quirks rather than realizing a fully developed character. Seen worse. (93 min)