I take no pleasure in tearing down a documentary that so obviously benefited everyone involved and could substantially promote awareness. But Fridrik Thor Fridriksson’s “The Sunshine Boy,” about one mother’s exploration of autism, its effects and her intention to help her own developmentally challenged son, simply doesn’t hold up as good cinema. Fridriksson is from Iceland, and that being the case, he’s enlisted the alien choral wails of Sigur Ros (and the groan-inducing obviousness of Bjork’s “Human Behavior”) to flood through the soundtrack and accompany overwrought scenes of a family traversing the gorgeous Icelandic countryside, peeking into caves and down over
cliffs at the abyss of darkness below, heavy-handedly suggesting the family’s own uncertain future. The artifice in moments like these is only enforced by the filmmaker’s decision to overdub the aforementioned mother, Margaret, with the voice of Kate Winslet, even as Margaret travels to the United States and clearly engages in English language conversations. This is in keeping with Fredriksson’s decision to have Winslet provide a narration, also a dubious choice since said narration is scripted from Margaret’s perspective. All this is in the service of bringing in a larger audience, as the director put it, and though that’s understandable, it does give the film an awkward vibe, as it essentially lacks Margaret’s personality, and thus her journey is harder to engage with. Also, don’t forget that this is a documentary; bringing in the big numbers is an unlikely goal no matter how many Academy Award winning voices you recruit – at least unless the film being made has to do with polar bears or penguins or something. [C+]- Sam C. Mac
TIFF Review: ‘The Sunshine Boy’
