Review of Hoot (2006) by Anthony K — 08 Mar 2010

This is a kids' movie about Roy Eberhart (Logan Lerman) who moves to the small town of Coconut Cove, Florida. He first faces the usual problems of blending in with the other kids at his middle school and dealing with the local school bully on the bus. After a rocky start he meets a tall blonde girl (Brie Larson) who slowly comes to trust him, and her stepbrother, the barefoot speed demon( Cody Linley) nicknamed "Mullet Fingers," for his manual fishing skills who has a passion for the environment and is strongly opposes the growing tourism industry. Together the three of them team up to thwart a greedy restaurant executive and try to protect endangered burrowing owls from being bulldozed at an illegal construction site.

The meaning and lesson in this movie is a nice one because what was done to the owls was illegal anyway. But one illegality does not condone another e.g. vandalizing the property etc so I would advise children seeing it to have an adult capable of explaining the moral implications of the actions taken by the teens in this film. Robert Wagner makes a token appearance as Mayor Grandy and Luke Wilson does a decent job in his role of Officer Delinko. You will love the music of Jimmy Buffett that was played throughout the movie. Filmed in South Florida, the scenery is beautiful and natural, the owls are adorable and the movie highlights an interesting environmental issue about doing all you can to save endangered animals.