The Way Way Back works because of a great cast. Even when a character is objectively awful or inappropriate, the actors manage to fill in the historical blanks to make them sympathetic while not scaling back on that awfulness. It is a slice of life about finding acceptance in a community and being comfortable with who you are even if you are not the best or even remotely close to adequate at any part of your life. There is a lot of implicit pain, and at the end of the film, there aren’t any magical transformations. No one wins any trophies or gets the girl, but the characters do recognize who really values you and who doesn’t. I found it so touching in its depiction of each character’s desperation to find acceptance or seem like fitting in that I’m going to overlook (by noting it) the cliché scene where the teenage main character is taught how to ogle teenage girls while on the job by a middle-aged man.