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Movies & TV Movies & TV Reviews

Boychoir

BOYCHOIR (François Girard). 103 minutes. Opens Friday (March 27). For venues and times, see Movies. Rating: NN

Where to watch: Netflix, iTunes


The music in Boychoir will make your ears perk up, but the drama is a symphony of false notes. The coming-of-ager from Canadian director François Girard (The Red Violin) follows a Texas boy from the wrong side of the tracks who finds himself in a prestigious East Coast music school. Call it The Blind Side without the black people.

Newcomer Garrett Wareing plays Stet, an 11-year-old disaster who hits a kid in the head with a trash can at school, then goes home to his shack and cleans up after his alcoholic mother. Too bad this efficiently schematic scene from his hard life feels completely artificial.

Mom dies, and through some savvy (and unbelievable) hustling by his principal, Stet ends up under the care of the fictional National Boychoir Academy, headed by jaded genius Carvelle (Dustin Hoffman). You might forgive Hoffman for sleepwalking through this performance, given the deadly dull and predictable proceedings. No matter – even a yawning Hoffman is a mighty presence, especially compared to the raw actors in the choir.

Hoffman is matched by Kathy Bates and Eddie Izzard, who avoid taking the material too seriously in delightfully goofy turns as fellow instructors. They help the audience pass the time between angelic musical sessions in which the kids lip-synch in harmony and Girard shoots for maximum uplift.

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