Hellion

source: Hellion

As a foreigner traveling in America, I would classify this as . . .exemplary Amercian Cinema. The inclusion of guns and authority issues noted. But this is raw, truthful American cinema; no Hollywood/Disney fluff. This is the purest kind of family tauma about the remnants of a family trying to stay together. Again, the "Amercicanisms" of guns and violence and famly dysfunctionality overlooked, this is just good American drama. Kudos to the cast and writers.

Hellion also known as Retribution is a slight tale from writer and director Kat Candler which has slow, unrushed placing. The film chronicles a family on the edge of destruction in rural Southeast Texas. Jacob Wilson (Josh Wiggins) likes heavy metal and loves motocross biking. He and his mates also get into vandalism and arson. Unfortunately for them, for every wrong move they make the police are immediately on to them. His father Hollis (Aaron Paul) is also broken. He his grieving over the loss of his wife, drinks too much and not spending enough time to look after his two children, their house is squalid. Hollis was a one time local baseball star. His actions also brings him to the attention of the police. The behaviour of both puts the younger son Wes at risk and into the hands of the child protection services who have him fostered out to his aunt Pam (Juliette Lewis.) Things take a turn for the worse when Jacob and his gang go to the aunt's house to visit Wes. The film has naturalistic performances from the child actors which is the big plus for the film. Everything is low key, fatalistic even. The only thing sunny here is the weather. The pacing is uneven as the film is a slow burner. There is too much contrivances, the police seem to be always there when there is trouble which is hard to swallow. There is irony to see Lewis being terrorised at the end of the movie from a gang of kids, after all she did her share of terrorising twenty years ago in films like Natural Born Killers.

"What are you troublemakers up to? Based on Kat Candler's own short film, Hellion is a movie that tries to explore the life of a thirteen year old boy named Jacob (Josh Wiggins) who has recently lost his mother, and to make things worse his father (Aaron Paul) has been emotionally absent while drowning himself in booze. It is no surprise that Jacob has been expressing his rebellion by participating in several acts of vandalism along with his neighborhood friends. When word gets out that his little brother, Wes (Deke Garner), is being dragged into this lifestyle, CPS places him in the care of their Aunt Pam (Juliette Lewis). Hollis loves his children, but he is still hurting for the loss of their mother and when he realizes that he is also losing his children he tries to change, but the focus of the film is on Jacob who thinks he can make things right by winning a local dirt bike competition. This is a coming of age film that tries to portray the family dynamics in an authentic way, but it never fully avoids the genre clichés. Hellion lacks some subtlety, but it benefits from a strong lead performance from Josh Wiggins. Besides directing, Candler wrote the screenplay for this film in which she has no intention of shining a light on the innocence of this kid, but rather portraying him as a victim of his circumstance due to the neglect of his father. Somehow the film failed to connect with me and I wouldn't recommend it over other brilliant coming of age films. Clocking at just under 100 minutes the pacing of the film does seem to be a problem as well and many scenes could've been cut out of the movie. We are repeatedly batted over the head with Jacob's rebellious behavior and it got a bit tiresome after a while. The soundtrack consists of mostly heavy metal tracks which both Jacob and his father like to indulge in while at home. The story takes place in a small southern Texas town which is gorgeously captured by Brett Pawlak's shaky cameras. Unfortunately everything that Hellion tries to say has been said before in other better films. What Hellion has going for it are the strong performances. Josh Wiggins is outstanding as the lead character in the film. It is hard to get a good performance from young teen actors at times, but Wiggins is a natural and he delivers an authentic portrayal of a troubled teen who is struggling to understand why the world has turned its back on him. Deke Garner plays his younger brother in a subtle manner. He is mostly a sponge that tries to absorb what the people around him say to him. Garner had worked with Candler in the short which this film is based on. Imagine if Aaron Paul's character from Breaking Bad would've been rehabilitated after finding a lovely wife and having two children with her. Later he loses his wife and falls in despair all over again, but instead of drowning his sorrows in drugs he does so with booze. Paul is playing this character full of anger once again who doesn't seem to know how to raise his children on his own. It was refreshing to see Juliette Lewis playing a normal role and trying to be a good role model for her nephews. This is Josh Wiggins movie and he elevates the material in such a way that he makes this a watchable experience despite lacking originality and subtlety.