Kernel Rating (out of 5):
MPAA Rating: NR Length: 87 minutes
Age Appropriate for: 15+. The film would probably translate to a PG-13: There is cursing, drug use, the death of a beloved pet, and one comically violent scene where someone gets stabbed in the eye with a spoon (it’s more funny than gory), but no obscene or sexually graphic situations. The f-word and s-word are its most prevalent offenders.
‘Boy’ is, in fact, a film about a boy. But it’s also a coming-of-age tale that is more emotionally involving—and far funnier—than most of the similarly themed films coming out of Hollywood nowadays. Maybe that’s because ‘Boy’ is from New Zealand.
By Roxana Hadadi
“Boy” director and writer Taika Waititi is impossible to dislike. At an interview in Washington, D.C., this week, Waititi is charming, funny, and gregarious, utterly warm and welcoming—the exact opposite of the selfish, deadbeat dad he plays in his film. This Waititi is not the convict Alamein, a widower, drug user, and absent father who is trying to escape his past. This Waititi wasn’t even supposed to be Alamein at all.