Concerned parents should preview the film. Most teens will laugh at the slapstick and innuendo even if they don't get all of it, or grasp the allusions to '60s pop culture. James Caan plays Kieran Johnson, a burned-out Chicago teacher who goes to Ireland to learn who his father was in this sometimes melodramatic and cliched yet affecting yarn. This odd, nearly wordless tale of selfless love could delight romantic and intellectual high-schoolers. An early sequence shows brutal soldiers of an African dictatorship arresting a schoolteacher.
Some characters drink.
When he asks what he can do to win her, she says he must get her husband out of jail in Africa. In a series of moody, impressionistic, music-filled scenes, Mr. Kinsky proves the generosity of his love.