A BOY CALLED SAILBOAT

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Australian actor-turned-director Cameron Nugent’s debut feature is an inept magical realist story infused with a tone-deaf sense of humor and a vague sense of thematic direction. This film’s rudderless political subtext, involving an immigrant Mexican family living in an unnamed dusty American border town, gives way to bizarre sexual content (witness Jake Busey’s cock-show as an elementary school teacher in tight sweat pants with no underwear). A pro-Big-Tobacco message gets smuggled in for good measure. Shooting guns into the air for no reason also happens out of context. Nothing adds up.

Noel Gugliemi plays Jose, a face-tattooed Chicano family man with Meyo (Elizabeth De Razzo), his loyal housekeeping wife, and their six-year-old son Sailboat (Julian Atocani Sanchez). Jose supports his family’s leaning ramshackle house with a single wood beam that prevents the structure from collapsing on its occupants, ostensibly killing them. Jose drives around in a homie-not-approved four door ‘50s Oldsmobile missing its backseat doors.

There might be some arcane political commentary the filmmakers are attempting to make with the collapsing-house metaphor, but it doesn’t come across. 

The child actor Sanchez delivers monotone voice over narration that upends the movie before it gets started.

“You find the most important things when you’re not looking.” Sailboat finds a ukulele that every character inexplicably calls a guitar.

This “important thing” enables our young musical prodigy to write a song that casts a spell over anyone who hears it. The problem is that the filmmakers didn’t go to the trouble of creating a piece of music to fill the bill. They instead play a single tone akin to a honking car horn whenever Sailboat performs his soul-quenching sonic creation. This is just lazy filmmaking. It’s infuriating for an audience to feel so openly insulted by irresponsible filmmakers.

Without irony, a repeating guitar motif arrives in the guise of “The Sound of Silence.”

J.K. Simmons’s presence seemingly endorses “A Boy Called Sailboat,” although the A-List actor probably shot his scenes in a single day, and didn’t know much about the movie beyond his isolated bit as a used vehicle salesman in the middle of nowhere.

The people who come from miles around to hear Sailboat play his (silent) song sure do enjoy Meyo’s spicy meatballs. There are a lot of things not right about “A Boy Called Sailboat,” not the least of which are the mixed messages the film sends to kids. This is not a movie to leave laying around for your children to watch alone or even with parental guidance.

Not Rated. 92 mins.