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Page to Screen
Wil Shriner’s Hoot
by Claire E. Gross
Carl Hiassen’s Hoot won hearts,
minds, and a 2003 Newbery Honor with eccentric characters, offbeat
humor, and a cause worth championing. Middle-schooler Roy, unwillingly
relocated to Coconut Cove, Florida, is being pummeled by a school-bus
bully when he notices a barefoot, backpack-free boy running through
the neighborhood. Fascinated, he investigates. Running Boy, it turns
out, has escaped from boarding school and is living outdoors while
his stepsister, Beatrice, brings him food. Nicknamed Mullet Fingers
for his ability to catch fish, the mystery boy is responsible for
vandalizing the construction site of a new pancake franchise that
threatens the local habitat of burrowing owls. Roy and tough-girl
Beatrice soon join him in the quest to save the owls, and the subsequent
friendship enriches the lives of all three.
The book’s fast pace, large cast, and frequently
shifting perspective translate well to film, creating a natural
rhythm for scene changes. The cinematography alone generates all
the owl-empathy the National Wildlife Federation (a partner, along
with Walden Media and New Line Cinema, in producing the film) could
hope for, and Shriner’s directorial choices further amplify
the book’s already prevalent conservationist theme. From the
opening panoramic shot of Roy (astride a horse, no less) gazing
out over his beloved Montana countryside, to Roy and Mullett Fingers’s
tour of the natural wonders of the Florida coast, to the revelatory
minute of silence that allows the entire town of Coconut Cove to
see the owls in all their feathery appeal, Hoot is always
on-message — and therein lies its primary failing as an adaptation.
On the page, the message was subsumed into the affecting story of
the trio’s developing friendship. Onscreen, that friendship
proves more important to the owls than to the children themselves,
whose sharp-edged quirks and tribulations are sanded down to create
smoother, dedicatedly wholesome characters. Unfortunately, “wholesome”
too often translates as “unprovocative.”
Shriner also chooses to tone down or overlook
the moral ambiguities of Mullett Fingers’s actions, which,
though ultimately harmless, border on eco-terrorism. Not only does
this simplification further exaggerate the David-and-Goliath qualities
of the plot, it also compromises the complexity of Mullett Fingers’s
character, which was one of the most intriguing and rewarding aspects
of the book. In the book, Mullett Fingers tapes closed the mouths
of poisonous snakes before leaving them to spook the franchise’s
snarling guard dogs, an act that highlights his uncanny affinity
with animals and disturbing propensity for self-endangerment. In
the movie, he simply dumps the snakes at the build site, thus actually
risking the dogs to save the owls, a contradiction completely ignored
by the film. Does this mean conservationism and kindness are to
be reserved for the cute, docile animals?
Beatrice, meanwhile, played with wistful, snappy
sincerity by Brie Larson, is sadly de-toothed. Sure, she still beats
up the bully, but she is far more trusting and vulnerable than expected,
and some of her rougher (and funnier) moments, such as giving Roy’s
bike a flat tire with her teeth, are eliminated altogether. Logan
Lerman’s Roy is similarly earnest, but when Mullett Fingers’s
arbitrary rehabilitation robs Roy of the opportunity to act as the
moral compass of the group, his character is relegated to observer
and occasional sidekick — rarely questioning his new friends
and never confronting the bully.
Luke Wilson’s Officer Delinko is deliciously
inept, and the actor mines every gaffe for laughs without destroying
the character’s underlying, if bumbling, nobility. Other adult
characters receive less subtle treatment. Chuck E. Muckle, the CEO
of Paula’s Pancakes, is particularly appalling. His sinister
corporate amorality transformed here into raving, manic obsession,
he is a cardboard Disney villain entirely lacking in true venom:
we know from the moment he appears that his downfall is assured.
Hoot-the-movie isn’t bad. It has
a well-shaped plot, ably and coherently adapted from the book; a
talented cast; a beautifully shot setting. It has the nostalgic,
summery appeal of kids riding their bikes, playing pranks, beating
the bad guy. But in the end, it’s a paint-by-numbers production,
its wholesome message obviously geared toward parents and teachers
as much as kids. It’s lost the challenges, the quirks, and
the questions of the original, and, while it provides a beautiful
visual realization of Hiassen’s vision, in the end it is a
reduction of, not an addition to, the story.
Claire
E. Gross is Assistant Editor of The Horn Book Magazine.
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