Honey Boy
From a screenplay by Shia LaBeouf, based on his own experiences,
award-winning filmmaker Alma Har’el brings to life a young actor’s stormy
childhood and early adult years as he struggles to reconcile with his father
through cinema and dreams. Fictionalising his childhood’s ascent to stardom,
and subsequent adult crash-landing into rehab and recovery, Har’el casts Noah
Jupe and Lucas Hedges as Otis Lort, navigating different stages in a frenetic
career.
LaBeouf takes on the daring and therapeutic challenge of playing a version of
his own father, an ex-rodeo clown and a felon. Artist and musician FKA twigs
makes her feature-film debut, playing neighbour and kindred spirit to the
younger Otis in their garden-court motel home. Har’el’s feature narrative
debut is a one-of-a-kind collaboration between filmmaker and subject, exploring
art as therapy and imagination as hope.
Critic Reviews:
- " The movie feels very raw. LaBeouf's voice is very unfiltered through
this movie… You can tell that he's working through things as he writes the
movie. " – Moira MacDonald
- " Is quite remarkable in its softness, in its emotion, and in [Shia
LaBeouf's] heartfelt manner in showing his dad the type of love he deserved when
he needed it the most. " – Paul Byrnes
- " Honey Boy is an equally unsettling and dreamlike portrait of an artist
and their journey throughout life. " – David
Stratton