Boy

Inspired by Waititi’s Oscar-nominated short, "Two Cars, One Night," (which the filmmaker developed into a feature at the Sundance Writer's Lab), BOY is set in 1984 in the remote Maori community of WaihauBay, a location whose natural splendor only serves to underscore the hardscrabble life of its inhabitants. At the center of the story is eleven year-old "Boy" (played by newcomer James Rolleston), a high-spirited adolescent obsessed with American pop culture - especially Michael Jackson - and prone to particularly vivid fantasies about his long-absent father, (played by Waititi), whom he imagines as an adventurous world traveler. When his father returns, Boy discovers, instead, a lovable loser who has been serving a seven-year sentence for robbery, and inveterate schemer whose daydreams are no more grounded in reality than his son's. Confronting the enormous contrast between the father he longed for and the one he has, Boy crosses the threshold into adulthood, having proven himself both strong enough and smart enough to live a better life than his dad's.