You Needn't Rush to See This Film

Rating: 3/10 (15 August 2008)

I'm usually a sucker for films about lost love, joyful reunions, and impossible dreams fulfilled, with everyone living happily ever after as the final credits roll. But the premise here is so preposterous I actually laughed at the sappy ending, a culmination of so many unlikely coincidences it was totally unbelievable. Freddie Highmore is charmingly earnest as the titular character, a young boy who feels mystically drawn to the parents he never knew, from whom he supposedly inherited a musical genius that allows him to play instruments flawlessly the first time he touches them and write a majestic classical symphony after taking a few classes at Julliard. Robin Williams, in a typically manic performance, is the Fagin-like character who welcomes August into the lair of lost boys he sends out to perform as street musicians and whose contributions he collects at the end of the day. If you're willing to believe a twelve-year-old would be called upon to conduct the New York Philharmonic in Central Park, and his long-lost parents magically would find each other in an audience of thousands sprawled across the vast Sheep Meadow, then this malarkey should delight you to no end.