Hoot

Last week, on this very site, I reviewed a wonderful little family film called Akeelah and the Bee. That film was a smart, honest, and funny story that was able to rise above its cliched underdog story and achieve the goal of being one of the better live action family films I have seen in a while. This weekend's family release, Hoot, is almost the polar opposite of that film. Whereas Akeelah was intelligent and avoided manipulations and sugar coating, Hoot is a movie that so desperately wants to be a quirky crowd pleaser and all but fails in just about every way. It's not smart, and for a movie that's supposed to bring home an environmental message, it surprisingly has very little to say. When a film spends so little amount of time on its topic that you actually find yourself forgetting why the heroes are going through all the trouble in the first place, you know you're doing something wrong.

Our young hero is a preteen named Roy Eberhardt (Logan Lerman). His dad's job requires the family to move around a lot, and as the story begins, he's just recently moved to the seaside town of Coconut Grove, Florida. He wastes no time in running afoul of the local school bully (Eric Phillips), but is luckily eventually able to befriend two of the quirkiest kids in the neighborhood. They are the school's tomboyish tough girl Beatrice (Brie Larson) and her mysterious rebel freedom-fighter brother who goes by the nickname of Mullet Fingers (Cody Linley). These two kids spend all their time fighting to save the environment from greedy tycoons who like to build fancy hotels and restaurants in their area. Right now, they are busy battling some people who want to build a pancake chain restaurant on a ground where some endangered owls live. These aren't any ordinary owls, this kind live in tunnel-like holes in the ground, and if the restaurant is built as planned, the holes will be covered up and they will die. To prevent this from happening, Mullet Fingers sneaks into the construction site every night and sabotages their efforts. With the evil head of the restaurant chain (Clark Gregg) coming personally to bulldoze the ground, the kids will have to act fast in order to save their feathered friends, all the while avoiding a dim-witted local cop (Luke Wilson) put in charge of investigating the vandalism acts that keep on happening every night.

Hoot is apparently based on a popular children's novel, and I'm sure this light story would seem cute to a 10-year old on the printed page. But as a 90-minute movie, the film is just too slight and forgettable to make even the slightest impression. Writer-director Will Shriner tells his story with such a laid-back tone that it almost seems to be hardly moving at all. Despite the fact that the kids are supposedly in a race to save the lives of these endangered owls, they still have plenty of time to fish, fight bullies, and generally walk around doing nothing so the movie can show off the pretty Florida scenery. I wasn't exactly expecting a thrill-a-minute ride when I bought my ticket to this movie, but you know your movie has pacing problems when one of the children sitting in the row behind me became more interested in counting the number of popcorn kernels he had left in his bag than in watching what was up on the screen. The movie wants to be a message film to interest kids in endangered species, but the funny thing is, the owls and the plot surrounding them make such rare appearances that I once actually completely forgot about them. The owls themselves pop up two, maybe three times in the entire movie, and are often overshadowed by the subplot about Roy dealing with the evil bully at school. This subplot in turn leads to an absolutely ludicrous story point where Roy's apparently moronic parents force him to write a letter of apology to the violent bully after Roy accidently punches him in the face while trying to escape from the evil kid's choke hold.

That's the big problem with Hoot all around. This is one of those movies where the kids are smarter than every single adult, except for the kid's marine biology teacher, who is played by recording artist Jimmy Buffett. (Not only does he have a supporting role in the film, but he also recorded all the songs for the soundtrack and is credited as one of the producers.) Of course, being smarter than the adults is not hard in this movie, since every single adult figure in this movie is apparently either an oblivious moron or a money-grubbing tyrant who wants to kill innocent baby owls that live in holes. Take Luke Wilson's character as the local law enforcement officer. The man is depicted as being a kindhearted, yet obviously clueless buffoon, who is just a couple notches higher on the IQ chart than the Barney Fife character on the old Andy Griffith Show. Even though he's not that bad of a guy, the movie wastes no opportunity in humiliating him, going so far as to forcing him to drive around town in a modified golf cart vehicle after his police cruiser gets wrecked by the Mullet Fingers kid. Equally embarrassing is the foreman of the construction crew played by Tim Blake Nelson in a repeat performance of the exact same character he played six years ago as one of the slow-witted convicts in O Brother, Where Art Thou? He talks like he learned English by watching reruns of The Beverly Hillbillies, and generally comes across as every stupid Southerner stereotype rolled into one character. And, as mentioned earlier, Roy's own parents seem to care less as they are so oblivious to his actions that they almost come across as neglectful parents that should be arrested. The movie constantly asks us to suspend disbelief that these kids could get away with some of their sabotage actions without any adult figure punishing and/or noticing them. I'd really like to know how this Mullet Fingers was able to find and capture a full-sized alligator, and place it in the construction crew's outhouse without anyone noticing.

The three main child actors generally don't offend, even if a lot of the kids in this movie seem to be a bit too old to be playing preteens. They do what they can with their limited roles, they're just held back by a screenplay that obviously doesn't care about making them interesting characters. I could pretty much say the same for everyone in the cast. Luke Wilson is at least able to let some likeable charm slip through in his underwritten role when the movie isn't forcing him to act like a total idiot for the amusement of the kids in the audience. The only highlight of the movie is the Florida scenery which is photographed very well and does give the movie a certain style. The visual style is warm and comforting, which I guess kind of matches the leisurely pace of the film's plotting. This can only take you so far, and it doesn't take long for you to realize that there's just not a lot to Hoot overall.

I guess this is one of those cases where what works on the page doesn't always work on the big screen. I could actually see Hoot working maybe as an hour-long TV special or something, but as a full-blown theatrical release, the film leaves much to be desired. I have not read the book that inspired this adaptation, so I don't know how faithful it is. I just couldn't escape the feeling that something must have been lost in the transition. Maybe the young fans of the novel will find something to enjoy, but I highly doubt anyone else will find much to get excited about here.

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