On the verge of 17, Jenny, fresh-faced, skilled in literature and cello, on the path to Oxford greatness at a Twickenham girls’ school in 1961, knows it’s not a good idea to get in the hand-built luxury car, the color of just-welled blood, that pulls up to offer a ride in the rain one day at the start of “An Education.”

The driver, the just-dashing-enough David, (Peter Sarsgaard) knows that too.

“I am, however, a music lover,” he yells, smiling rakishly, through the pouring rain. “I’m worried about your cello. So what I propose is, you put it in the car and walk alongside me.”

He even forks over a wad of cash, just in case, as she proposes, he drives off with her precious instrument. And, intrigued by both his above-average proposition and the potential for her to be the object of desire for a luxury car-driving man who puts the effort into making above-average propositions, Jenny (played by Carey Mulligan) decides to put some money into this game she’s never played before, and see how well she can gamble it.

The game is well played, if a little harrowing, especially for those of us who remember how reckless we can be at nearly 17 — especially when we think we’re being smarter, more enlightened, more fearless and more bright-eyed than the old folks around us, what with their jobs and bills and silly lives that don’t allow them endless travel, fun, music, drink, fashion, art and larks. With David’s dashing, enamored eyes upon her, Jenny shines like the only girl in the world, like he’s the only one who’s ever noticed her — or at least he’s the only one who sees exactly how wonderful she’ll be in a few years.

If only there were a shortcut to that glamorous person she knows she’ll be, Jenny thinks.

Invigorated by the glamor (Horse races! Adult friends! Cultured conversation! Mod fashion!) and attention, her Latin suffers. She becomes adorably insolent. Who has time for stodgy dinners at home with the parents and nervous teenage boys when there are auctions of Edward Burne-Jones paintings to attend, Juliette Gréco LPs to swoon to, pretend meetings with C.S. Lewis one can use as subterfuge to sneak off on romantic weekends? As all 17-year-olds do, Jenny Has It Figured Out.

“Studying is hard and boring,” she shouts, in an outburst at school. “Teaching is hard and boring. So you’re telling me to be bored, and then bored, and then finally bored again, this time for the rest of my life. This whole stupid country is bored. There’s no life in it, or color in it, or fun in it. It’s probably just as well that the Russians are going to drop a nuclear bomb on us any day now. So my choice is either to do something hard and boring, or to marry my — my Jew, and go to Paris and Rome and listen to jazz and read and eat good food in nice restaurants and have fun. It’s not enough to educate us any more, Mrs. Walters. You’ve got to tell us why you’re doing it.”

Of course, David’s method of being “clever” has drawbacks Jenny couldn’t have imagined. What he admits isn’t the full story — even if it does dissolve any misgivings her parents have. In such a light, it’s hardly surprising that, for all her literary knowledge, Jenny still has no idea that naivete is creeping up behind her, waiting to snap her neck.

There is a decided amount of creepy, heart-breaking, had-to-happen betrayal in “An Education,” which is based on a memoir by Lynn Barber and translated to the screen by writer Nick Hornby (“High Fidelity”). There has to be, unless it aims to be nothing more than another soporific, female-subduing “Twilight” with proto-Beatle teddy boys instead of vampires. What makes it good is that the titular education comes not from the suave older man with the ins to all the jazz clubs, pastel-colored Sobranie cigarettes and romantic Parisian walks. What Jenny comes to realize about David — and about her dreamy Oxford as well — is that the posh credentials and easy connections don’t matter, at least when they’re easy. The important thing isn’t what they impart to you. It’s about what you get out of them.

Ashley O’Dell reviews movies that aren’t in theaters anymore.