Could be cheesy but is surprisingly poignant.

Rating: 8/10 (24 April 2015)

Complimentary tissues should be distributed prior to viewing this film about a boy bringing his father home from war using the power of hope and faith. What could have easily been a preachy film, Little Boy is poignant and inspiring.
Pepper Busbee (Jakob Salvati) is a very small boy; at eight years old he is dwarfed by by all the other kids his age. Pepper's best friend is his father James (Michael Rapaport). The two are a close pair, and Pepper depends on his father for all of his emotional well-being. It's wartime, and James has been called to duty to the dismay of Pepper, his older brother London (David Henrie), and their mother Emma (Emily Watson). After Pepper "moves" a bottle at a magician's show with his mind, he comes to believe that he also possesses the power to bring his father home. He turns to a local priest, Father Oliver (Tom Wilkinson), who gives Pepper a list of charitable acts; Father Oliver then tells him that if he completes everything on the list then he can make anything happen. As part of the list, Father Oliver instructs Pepper to befriend a Mr. Hashimoto (Cary -Hiroyuki Tagawa), who was just released from a Japanese internment camp and is being discriminated against in the town. Pepper does so begrudgingly, but he soon finds that he has more in common with Mr. Hashimoto than he thinks.
Director Alejandro Monteverde perfectly captures the idyllic life of a small coastal Californian town during the 1940s. Everything and everyone looks straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting to almost a whimsical effect. Montaverde also composes some stunning shots of his lead actor, who is a strikingly beautiful child. Salvati does a wonderful job bringing Pepper to life, a performance reminiscent of Jackie Cooper in the classic King Vidor film The Champ. He is very talented, bringing sorrow to Pepper but also a lightness and quick sense of humor. Pepper represents the best things about being a child- he is hopeful, gullible, and his love for his father knows no bounds.
Some of the story techniques in Little Boy are old hat and cheesy; the voice over from "old Pepper" was completely unnecessary, and some of the flashes to James at war were also a little overkill. A dream that Pepper has about the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima was also a very stylized sequence we don't need to see, as it just reinforces facts the audience already knows.
There's a fine line between cheesy and heartwarming and Little Boy is wavering on both sides. Luckily for the film and the audience, it leans heavier on the heartwarming side.

See more at: http://www.mediumraretv.org/review/little- boy/#sthash.50rSd6Ry.dpuf