After the lo-fi backyard hijinks of Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation and the "sweding" histrionics in Michel Gondry's terminally twee Be Kind Rewind, does the world really need another movie about a pair of buddies who decide to shoot their own version of a favorite flick using a trusty camcorder?

Yes, if the results are as affably charming and easy to take as the larkish Son of Rambow. Directed and written by Garth Jennings (the underappreciated Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy), Rambow premiered at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival and is only now making its way into theaters.

Set in a small English town during the mid-'80s, Jennings' movie finds the proper tone — cheeky and droll — and sticks with it for a good chunk of the just-about-right 96-minute running time. While it may lack a marquee name like Jack Black to help sell tickets, Rambow is actually a lot more enjoyable and a lot less full of itself than the insufferable Rewind.

Sensitive, artistically-inclined middle-schooler Will (Bill Milner) teams up with class bully Lee (Will Poulter) to make a movie for a local talent competition. The lads' project, Son of Rambow, is a quasi-sequel to Sylvester Stallone's First Blood, except that most of the roles, natch, are played by kids, including dweebish Will, who gives his own painstakingly earnest interpretation of disgruntled Vietnam vet John Rambo. Their Jackass-style stunts and homegrown special effects are endearingly amateurish, giving Rambow's sweding tomfoolery a definite edge over anything in the overblown Stallone vehicle.

My only real complaint is with the character of Will's single mom (Jessica Stevenson), a born-again zealot who belongs to some weird religious sect known as the Brethren. The fact that the organization really exists — and is apparently a pretty scary cult of raging Christian fanatics — only makes the cheap, queasy laughs at their expense all the more discomfiting. Or maybe I've simply been paying too much attention to the recent Texas polygamy scandal on the evening news.

Son of Rambow: Opens Friday at the Cedar Lee Theater, 2163 Lee Rd., Cleveland Heights, 440-564-2034, clevelandcinemas.com.