The Columbine shootings may give Pups a hint of importance, but really this Dog Day Afternoon for the Clearasil set is silly, hollow, and pretentious. When a director goes by one name only, you know it's time to worry. And when smug MTV host Kurt Loder gives a film's best performance, playing himself, you know you're in for serious trouble.

Bonnie and Clyde and Mickey and Mallory are ready for Social Security compared with the outlaws conjured by writer/director Ash. These hostage-taking bank robbers, the asthmatic Stevie and his loopy girlfriend Rocky, are only 13. They can barely get their little hands around their big guns, but they're savvy to the difference between a .44 and a .357 Magnum. All that violence, all that TV, all that suburban meaninglessness! No wonder they storm a bank and then can't take their eyes off the tube when local news and MTV begin live coverage of their exploits.

With better actors -- maybe the eerie kid from The Sixth Sense as Stevie -- Pups might have offered a prepubescent twist on a tired formula. Cameron Van Hoy tries hard, but he can't make the volatile Stevie believable. Be like the other kids, you're left thinking. Put down that gun and just stick to video games. Screens at the Copley Place Saturday, September 11 at 7 and 9:45 p.m. and Sunday, September 12 at noon and 2:30 and 4:45 p.m.