“Boy,” March 21

Thursday, March 21, 6:30 p.m.

Figge Art Museum, 225 West Second Street, Davenport IA

Winner of seven New Zealand Film & Television Awards including Best Film, Director, and Screenplay, and a work whose 2010 release made it the highest grossing New Zealand film to date, writer/director Taiki Waititi's Boy enjoys a March 21 Figge Art Museum screening in the venue's Free Film at the Figge series, its critical consensus at Rotten Tomatoes stating that the movie "possesses the offbeat charm associated with New Zealand film but is also fully capable of drawing the viewer in emotionally."

The title character of Boy, referred to simply as "Boy," is a dreamer who lives with his brother Rocky, a tribe of deserted cousins, and his Nan. Boy also worships Michael Jackson, yet his other hero, his father Alamein, is the subject of Boy’s fantasies, and the child imagines him as a deep sea diver, war hero, and a close relation of the King of Pop. In reality, however, Alamein is an inept, wannabe gangster who has been in jail for robbery. When Alamein returns home after seven years away, Boy is forced to confront the man he thought he remembered, find his own potential, and learn to get along without the hero he had been hoping for.

Waititi started developing Isoon after finishing the short film Two Cars, One Night, and it first emerged as a film called Choice. In 2005, the project was accepted into the Sundance Writer's Lab where Waititi workshopped it, but instead of making Boy his first film as a director, Waititi went on to make oddball romance Eagle vs Shark, and continued to develop the screenplay over the next three years. After the script was finally ready, Waititi raised $110,000 via Kickstarter to distribute the film in the United States. At the time, this was the most prominent example of crowdfunding in New Zealand. On its release in New Zealand, the film topped the box office receipts for the week, earning more on its opening day than any previous New Zealand film. Boy grossed nearly $900,000 in its first seven days, beating Alice in Wonderland and homegrown pictures Whale Rider and The World's Fastest Indian. It also climbed above international animated-fantasy hit How to Train Your Dragon and mythical action flick Clash of the Titans, and went on to become the highest grossing New Zealand film to date in the country. Peter Calder of The New Zealand Herald, meanwhile, gave the film five out of five stars, saying, Iit's hard to praise too highly the pitch-perfect tone of this movie."

Boy will be screened in Davenport's John Deere Auditorium on March 21, admission to the 6:30 p.m. showing is free, and audiences are invited to socialize and discuss the film afterward with a complimentary glass of wine. For more information, call (563)326-7804 and visit FiggeArtMuseum.org.