Showtimes & Tickets Enter Zip Code:

BOY A
Directed by John Crowley
Produced by Lynn Horsford
Written by Mark O'Rowe, based on the novel by Jonathan Trigell
Released by the Weinstein Company
UK. 100 min. Rated R
With Andrew Garfield, Peter Mullan, Katie Lyons, Shaun Evans, Alfie Owen & Taylor Doherty

Director John Crowley is a star maker. In his film debut, 2003’s black comedy Intermission, he gave Colin Farrell his best part up to that time, a role that was a startling blend of charm and thuggery. You never knew what to expect from his Irish con man. Although Farrell had already made many films up to that point, it took a low-budget indie shot on high-definition video to showcase his talents. (So that’s what all the Vanity Fair hype was about.)

In Crowley’s follow-up, the immediately likable newcomer Andrew Garfield gives a performance that goes against the grain of the understated and enigmatic approach more common with young actors today. Gangly Garfield is a live wire; every emotion comes through loud and clear. His character’s need to be understood and accepted almost overwhelms you. With a lopsided, winning smile, he’s hard to resist, especially when his eyes light up like a kid at Christmas when his caseworker, who goes by the name of Uncle Terry (Peter McMullan), presents him with a gift—Nike sneakers, most likely the only gift he’s received in over decade.

This occurs in the waiting room before the young man is released after a 14-year-long incarceration (he doesn’t even know what a DVD is). To the press, he’s known as Boy A; his real name, Eric Wilson, has been kept out of the news because of his age at the time of committing a brutal murder. To jump-start his new life, Eric picks the name Jack Burridge. Uncle Terry finds him a home and employment, where he becomes one of the blokes, and warns “Jack” not to reveal his past to anyone.

To most at the warehouse, Jack comes across as painfully shy. He’s really a kid in adult clothing, and bound to be the only guy not to have hit on secretary Michelle (Kate Lyons). In fact, she asks him out. Only during a raucous night on the town where Jack unwittingly takes a parole-violating hit of ecstasy do his demons let loose, briefly, in a bar fight, after which his friends refer to him as Steven “f*****’ Segal.

His skittish mannerisms hint of his life in prison; Crowley skips that period, but interweaves scenes from his childhood of neglect, where he (here played by Alfie Owen) takes part in petty theft, and worse, with his only friend and bad influence, Philip (Taylor Doherty).

The Manchester-set drama could be labeled as kitchen sink, but Crowley breaks free from that label. Far from dour, the mood matches Jack’s optimism with scenes bathed in light. The grizzly crime at the center of the story (which is not seen, thank God) belies the film’s sweetness, especially in Jack’s scenes with Michelle. Crowley is clearly on Jack’s side. He blunts the specifics of the horrific killing, making it unlikely that the viewer will turn against Jack. (On the other hand, Eric/Jack’s release hasn’t gone unnoticed by the tabloids, which aggressively pursue his whereabouts.) And towards the end, the script refreshingly becomes unexpectedly surreal, but not abruptly so. 

But is Jack supposed to be schizophrenic? The two actors playing Jack/Eric, though at different ages (24 and 10), have nothing in common in their physicality, looks or temperament. Mostly likely, the two actors never observed the other’s on-set work. The film challenges the viewer to reconcile the two different interpretations as one person. Kent Turner
July 23, 2008