Boy
2010 · Directed by Taika Waititi
Original language: English
- drama
- comedy
The story
Boy, an 11-year-old child and devout Michael Jackson fan who lives on the east coast of New Zealand in 1984, gets a chance to know his absentee criminal father, who has returned to find a bag of money he buried years ago.
What it’s like
Warm, sun-bleached and wistful, with a deadpan streak that keeps grief from ever feeling heavy. Much of it plays out in bright rural daylight: dusty paddocks, a rattling farm road, the ocean glinting along the coast, and the interiors of a crowded wooden house with its cluttered kitchen and shared beds. The camera is mostly steady and unfussy, with plenty of wide shots that let a small boy look lost in a big landscape, and the handheld moments are playful rather than urgent. The soundtrack leans on 1980s pop, Michael Jackson above all, mixed with easy acoustic folk, so the mood keeps swinging between daydream and dusty reality. Pacing is loose and conversational, with comic set pieces and quiet pauses that give the family room to breathe. Its emotional register is gentle and funny, with an arc about a boy who builds a fantasy father and slowly has to make peace with the real man. Violence is limited and mostly comic, with some scuffles, a brief bit of rough language and a few sad moments about neglect and loss; nothing graphic. For people who want a bittersweet, warm-hearted comedy with a dry sense of humour and a goofy, tender look at childhood, and who enjoy a sunny rural setting.
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