Clive Owen’s rough-hewn, just-this-side-of-caveman features don’t do
emotion easily, which sets his breakdown moments far apart from the
usual A-lister histrionics. Owen’s granite tendencies prove to be the
saving grace of The Boys Are Back, a mawkish assortment of life
lessons that its star more or less single-handedly keeps from devolving
into a mass of gorgeously lit, honey-colored sog.
Adapted from Simon Carr’s memoir, the story follows a boozy,
globe-trotting sportswriter whose idyllic life in the Australian
countryside crumbles when his wife (Laura Fraser, luminous in her
handful of scenes) succumbs to cancer, leaving him to deal with their
quasi-feral 5-year-old son. Matters are not helped—or are
they?—by the unexpected arrival of a neglected teenage son from a
previous London marriage.
Cookie-cutter predictable as the results may be, they do
occasionally hit the mark, with the burgeoning interaction between the
ill-equipped Owen and his two refreshingly nonidealized sons conjuring
up a few undeniable lumps in the throat. The problems mainly arise with
the material’s handling by director Scott Hicks (Shine, Snow
Falling on Cedars), a filmmaker whose visual gifts continue to
overpower his storytelling abilities. Utilizing an apparently endless
supply of sun-dappled landscapes and a lovely, noodling soundtrack full
to bursting with Sigur Rós songs, Hicks presents an eye-melting
rendering of his native South Australia—so ravishing, actually,
that it severely diminishes the emotional beats of the narrative. How
mopey can you be when you’ve got wallabies on your veranda?