Another fantastic film starring Michael Sheen. As well as Maria Bello, and Kyle Gallner, both recognizable, and well-known faces in the film industry, who both also did a fantastic job.Centering around a family, who've lost touch, Beautiful Boy hits incredibly close to home for late-teen-to-mid-twenties males, as well as parents. Kyle Gallner plays a depressed College student, dorming out-of- state, away from his family, who eventually breaks down, then plans, and executes a mass shooting at his school. The film revolves around the shock, and aftershock of the event, mainly how they effect his parents, who were already on rocky roads in their marriage.A fantastic, hard hitting, dark drama, which received a miniscule 6.5 here on IMDb, when it should be at least an 8.5/10.9.0/10, for Sheen's outstanding acting, as well as Bello, and Gallner's fantastic portrayals.

American choreographer and film director Shawn Ku's feature film debut which he co-wrote with screenwriter Michael Armbruster, is inspired by his family's personal connection to the Virginia High Tech massacre, the deadliest shooting incident by a single gunman in U.S history, which took place on 16. April 2007 in Blacksburg, Virginia and the unexpected death of a visiting friend. It premiered in the Zabaltegi-New Directors section at the 58th San Sebastián International Film Festival in 2010, was screened in the Discovery section at the 35th Toronto International Film Festival in 2010 and is an American production which was shot on location in Los Angeles and Santa Clarita, California in USA and produced by producers Lee Clay and Eric Gozlan. It tells the story about business man Bill Carroll and proof-reader Kate Caroll, a conflicted married couple who is on the verge of separating when they learn that their 18-year-old son Sam has shoot numerous students at his university, including himself. To get away from the media Bill and Kate move in with Kate's brother Eric and his wife Trish, but as time goes by they begin to question themselves as parents and is tormented by questions of why and how their son could have ended up doing what he did and if they could have done anything to prevent it.Finely and acutely directed by American filmmaker Shawn Ku, this quietly paced fictional tale which is narrated from the two main character's point of view, draws a compassionate and intimate portrayal of a married couple's struggle to recuperate and find their way back to each other after being left in shock and devastation by their young son. While notable for it's naturalistic milieu depictions, low-keyed production design by Hungarian production designer and art director Gabor Norman and realism, this dialog-driven indie and psychological drama depicts two dense and interrelated studies of character and contains a good score by Canadian composer Trevor Morris.This at times heartrending, at times romantic, at times humorous and at times afflicting love-story which examines themes like grief, guilt, marriage and love, is impelled and reinforced by it's subtle character development and the heartfelt and empathic acting performances by English actor Michael Sheen and American actress and singer Maria Bello. An authentic and humane character piece which gained, among other awards, the FIPRESCI Prize at the 35th Toronto International Film Festival in 2010.

In this nearly terrifying age where our children are growing significantly faster than we want them to, fear, anxiety, and near paranoia starts to overtake the best of parents. In America, we have witnessed, in this generation alone, some of the most evil ever conducted by mankind in all of history; the fall of the twin towers, the war in Iraq, the shooting massacre in Virginia Tech, all terrible staples in my memory and I'm not even thirty yet. What other horrors will this lifetime bring? As a new father, I want to wrap my daughter Sophia in a bubble and never let her see the light of day for fear of what she may either endure or be influenced by. Shawn Ku's Beautiful Boy examines the aftermath of a young man, Sammy, that commits a mass shooting at his school and ultimately takes his own life. Bill (Michael Sheen) and Kate (Maria Bello) are your average married couple. Held back by grief, guilt, and rage, Bill and Kate undertake the scrutiny from the presses and the families as the sole reasons for young Sammy's demise. How could you move on from a nightmare you couldn't wake up from? Ku takes on the story with ferocity, examining a vast subject, which perks our ears up and raises our eyebrows. Ultimately Ku fails at getting down to the emotional center of this tale. The narrative picks up rather quickly from the beginning but loses pace and theme quickly. It's not necessarily a failure on Ku's part or co-writer Michael Armbruster, simply not as evolutionary in terms of independent filmmaking. The premise is enticing enough to withstand its flaws and it does have moments of brilliance, especially in the scenes following the shooting. However, it's the powerful performances of Michael Sheen and Maria Bello that hook the viewer in and safely guide throughout. Michael Sheen delivers his finest performance since his towering work in Stephen Frears' The Queen. Sheen attacks the character unlike anything seen from him before. He is engaged and delivers the emotional peril of a heartbroken father attempting to pick up the pieces in the most magnificent ways possible. Sheen invites the viewer into his world, showing the ugliest and worst parts about him, and letting us form our own opinion. Downright brilliant. Maria Bello, who I fell in love with in David Cronenberg's A History of Violence, handles Kate with care, love, and ease. Bello's precision and dedication to the craft stands nearly on the top of most actresses today. It also equals one of her finest works in years. Her heart-on- the-sleeve approach not only allows us to respect Kate but it transforms her into a clear sign and example of masterclass acting. Where it can easily be taken over the top, Bello holds it right to the edge, never pushing us over. In a rare and personal plea, these two performances should well be on the Oscar radar. As a small and obviously personal film, Michael Sheen and Maria Bello deliver clear and cut, two of the most worthy performances of award's recognition this year. It's reminiscent of the same feeling Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams delivered in their powerful works in last year's Blue Valentine. In his briefest scenes, Kyle Gallner (Sammy) boils his performance to the rim and delivers a clever and daring performance. Beautiful Boy has raw and emotional power without falling all over itself with melodrama, but it does come up short in some narrative regards. But with these two talented actors in tow, the film will knock your socks right off in simple artistry.Read more reviews at Awards Circuit dot com.

BEAUTIFUL BOY fills a gap in our understanding of how events change us. The story is three stories, really: a marriage in disarray due to an increasing distance between a husband and wife, the terrifying discovery that an only child is dead, and the horror of the reality that that dead child murdered classmates and faculty at his college without a knowledgeable prodrome. It speaks loudly to contemporary marriages and families torn asunder by lack of communication in a time of sheltered or imposed privacy of cellphones, blogging, computers that prevent face to face communications at critical times.Bill (Michael Sheen) and Kate (Maria Bello) are living a stalemate of a marriage on the brink of ending: Kate is a proofreader for writers (currently for Cooper played with great sincerity by Austin Nichols) while Bill immerses himself in his business life. They now have separate bedrooms, their only tie is their son Sammy (Kyle Gallner) who is off to his first year of college. Bill and Kate learn that there has been a shooting incident at Sammy's college and that a number of students were killed. When police arrive at their home they receive the news that Sammy is among the dead but worse than that, Sammy is the one who killed all the students and faculty and they committed suicide. Bill and Kate are devastated, become the source of the paparazzi and move in with Kate's bother Eric (Alan Tudyk) and sister-in-law Trish (Moon Bloodgood) and their young son. The tension continues to build and when Kate attempts to hide her grief by caring for the brother's house and family, Bill and Kate move to a motel run by a compassionate clerk (Meat Loaf Aday). Events happen and Bill and Kate flirt with restoring their marriage only to separate: the manner in which they find their way back toward sanity by confronting their own demons is the quiet way in which this story ends. Instead of a predictable happy ending the audience is left in the throes of the mending process - a writer/director choice that makes the film far more dramatic than most.Sheen and Bello give razor sharp portrayals of these two devastated, questioning people. This is their film and the way they react to every moment of the story is simply uncanny. Their performances are staggeringly well done. But then the entire cast is polished, making this film a model for other films about difficult life situations credible. Grady Harp