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For anyone tired of all the big-budget blockbusters of the summer, Away We Go will be a breath of cool air. Who knew that Maya Rudolph (from SNL) and John Krasinksi (from The Office) could take this little idea of a movie and turn it into a comic gem in the style of The Graduate and Garden State?

This is the pop-indie movie people have been waiting for all summer (this and (500) Days of Summer) and boy, does it deliver on all fronts. You’ll leave the theatre smiling, just to turn around and watch it again.

The plot of Away We Go is pretty simple. Verona (Rudolph) and Burt (Krasinksi) - an un-married couple, by Verona's choice - decide they need to find a new place to raise their coming baby, and go on a kind of cross country journey in search for the perfect place.

They make stops in cities where they have family or friends, starting in Phoenix, then on to Madison, Montreal and Miami. The characters that populate each place are in turns hilarious, odd, and heart-breaking, but always well-developed, and appropriately human.

All these secondary characters are brought to life by first-rate acting, but the two winners have to be Maggie Gyllenhaal as LN- a Madison professor who has taken family life to a frightening level – and The West Wing’s Allison Janney, (who makes every picture she’s in better) Verona’s old colleague Lily, who is as vulgar and crass as she is hysterical.

Let’s be honest though; this is Rudolph and Krasinski’s picture. They make you believe in their quirky love the way Charlie Chaplin and Virginia Cherrill did in City Lights, the way Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck did in Roman Holiday and the way Zach Braff and Natalie Portman did in Garden State.

Rudolph is all kinds of sweet, sarcastic and sexy, totally underplaying a character that could have easily been destroyed by too much talk, too many tears…just too much. Watching her face as she battles her emotions shows the viewer exactly what she is experiencing.

I can only use superlatives for Krasinksi’s performance. He is flat-out fantastic in a role that calls for odd-ball humor, tender emotion and everything in between. This is the nail in the coffin for the handful of women out there who haven’t already fallen for Krasinski on The Office. The way he blends his trademark wit and humor with feeling and melancholy (and always managing to make it either hysterical or touching, as the situation calls for) is a wonder. Oscar take note – this is the kind of performance those little gold statues were made for.

Of course, three cheers go to real-life married couple Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida for their wonderfully written screenplay and Sam Mendes for his compassionate direction. Eggers and Vida deserve an Oscar nod for Original Screenplay, as well.

And props for tapping folk singer/songwriter Alexi Murdoch for the film’s main musical voice. He got left behind after The O.C. crowd forgot about him, but this should bring him to the wider audience he deserves.

Before they decide to go on their trip, Verona asks Burt if he thinks they’re fuck-ups. He replies in the negative, but she remains unconvinced. As the magic of Away We Go proves, the answer is an unequivocal “hell no.”