Pepper Flynt Busbee’s father is a soldier fighting in World War II. The seven-year-old boy uses a combination of faith and magic to do all that he can to bring his father back home. ‘Little Boy’ hit theaters on Friday, April 24.
‘Little Boy’ stars Jakob Salvati as Pepper Flynt Busbee, David Henrie as London Busbee, Kevin James as Dr. Fox, Emily Watson as Emma Busbee, Ted Levine as Sam, Michael Rapaport as James Busbee, Ali Landry as Ava, Ben Chaplin as Ben Eagle, Tom Wilkinson as Fr. Oliver, Toby Huss as Colonel Bob, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa as Hashimoto, Abraham Benrubi as Teacup, Kelly Greyson as Tyra, Sam Kindseth as Ronnie, Eduardo Verástegui as Fr. Crispin, James DuMont as Harvey, Candice Azzara as Bertha, Lukas Behnken as Leonard Rice, Mary Stein as Martha, Winston James Francis as Bukha, Masami Kosaka as Commander Tokyo Joe, and Theodora Greece as Eliza.
The film received an Audience Score of 87%. The average rating was 4.5/5 out of 3,058 user ratings. It received a 14% on the Tomatometer and has an average rating of 4.4/10. Out of 36 reviews for the film it received 5 fresh tomatoes and 31 rotten tomatoes.
Alejandro Gómez Monteverde directed the film. Joan Sobel and Fernando Villena edited the film. The $20 million budget film features music by Stephan Altman and Mark Foster. Metanoia Films and Santa Fé Films produced the film. Open Road Films distributed it. It runs for 100 minutes.
Reviews from Rotten Tomatoes:
"Believe the impossible," the tagline commands. It's a promise this shameless film has no intention of breaking,” wrote A.A. Dowd from AV Club.
“Tolerance, World War II history and faith are served up with a sticky sentimental gloss in the family film "Little Boy," wrote Robert Abele from the Los Angeles Times.
“Little Boy" answers a question most tear-jerkers wouldn't have the nerve to ask: Can the bombing of Hiroshima be manipulated narratively, if briefly, into a position of warming our hearts? The answer is no,” wrote Michael Phillips from the Chicago Tribune.
“This is an ersatz version of the '40s based on other movies' ersatz versions, a Candyland-colored world seen from a child's point of view if that child was a 30-ish filmmaker,” wrote Peter Keough from the Boston Globe.
“The problem here isn't theological; even if it were in service of a different message entirely, the sheer gracelessness of Monteverde's storytelling would be a massive turnoff,” wrote Justin Chang from Variety.