It’s been a while since a good romantic comedy found its way into theaters. Too bad moviegoers are still waiting.

The storyline of “Win a Date with Tad Hamilton!” is all too familiar: somewhat dorky boy loves girl … girl loves decisively more attractive guy … decisively more attractive guy falls for girl … girl is forced to choose between somewhat dorky boy and decisively more attractive guy.

Sometimes this formula works, as in “Bridget Jones’ Diary” or even “Legally Blonde,” but not here. This film lacks the ingenuity and tongue-in-cheek interplay present in those two films.

It has a typical Hollywood plot that director Robert Luketic attempts to pass off as original by making the leading lady more virtuous than all-out sexy and mixing humor and sincerity in scenes that are more awkward than moving.

The story opens in majestic Frasier’s Bottom, West Virginia, where Rosalee Futch (Kate Bosworth) and her best friends Cathy (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Pete (“That ’70s Show’s” Topher Grace) spend their quiet afternoons ringing up produce and snack cakes at the local Piggly Wiggly.

Alongside this picture ripped out of the 1950s, we witness the rebellious life of Tad Hamilton (Josh Duhamel), an actor whose womanizing ways and bad boy facade have his manager (“Will and Grace’s” Sean Hayes) and agent (Nathan Lane) worried that his career will quickly diminish once America finds out he’s not as wholesome as the characters he plays.

All the simplicity of Rosalee’s life changes, however, when she enters a contest to win a date with Tad Hamilton.

The contest is contrived as a charity project by Richard Levy (Hamilton’s manager) as a means to improve Hamilton’s image, and when Rosalee wins, she is immediately zipped off to Los Angeles first class to meet the man of her dreams.

The problem is, Pete, Rosalee’s best friend of 22 years (and boss, as it is), has yet to profess his secret love for the oblivious checkout clerk, and much to his dismay, the entranced Hamilton follows his small-town girl back to the farm.

Then the real contest begins.

The dorky guy who never really had a chance and the Hollywood heartthrob who may be too good to be true are left to fight it out between raw competition and rhetoric.

Up until this point, it is impossible to even detect the chemistry between Pete and Rosalee. Their initial scenes together don’t even hint at any potential romantic liaisons. It is only when Tad returns that Pete realizes he has to act.

The whole triangle is, at best, laughable. The only appearance worth paying attention to is Topher Grace, who plays the virginal Eric on “That ’70s Show.” His character is simultaneously dorky, witty, sensitive, brash and charming.

Something similar can be said of Josh Duhamel, who, it must be said, plays Hollywood-bad-boy-turned-West-Virginia-farmer Tad Hamilton with surprising ease. On the same token, you never really know which side he’s playing, so it’s hard to know how to judge him.

Much less can be said of Kate Bosworth, whose wholesome and virtuous character could only be found today amidst the Amish.

More or less, the film is an idealistic representation of first loves and lusts. What “Hamilton” lacks in substance it makes up for with, well … Topher Grace.

It’s quirky and it’s cute, but that’s about it.

Grade: C-