NOWHERE BOY

Beatlemaniacs may chomp at the bit for more, well, Beatles stuff, but Nowhere Boy is otherwise a solid drama about a kind-of-bad good kid (named John Lennon) who just wants to reconnect with his mom.

Nowhere Boy is an entertaining and sometimes sad depiction of the teen years of John Lennon, who, unless you lived in a cave for all of modern times, became a worshipped rock and roll icon with The Beatles. Because the lead actor (Aaron Johnson) doesn't really look like Lennon, and because there is a notable lack of wink-wink Beatles references (though it opened with the single, recognizable chord of the beginning of A Hard Day's Night... woo!), it's easy to slip into watching the film as just a solid drama about a kid learning about his effed-up family secrets.

Raised by his aunt Mimi (Kristin Scott Thomas, stern and frosty as usual... rrrowr!) in working class Liverpool, John finds out that his freewheeling birth mother Julia (Anne-Marie Duff) actually has just lived down the road the whole time. He seeks her out, and they have a notably weird mother/son reunion that seems more like the flirty girl getting a new boy toy. Ew. But John, being a bad boy who starts ignoring school for thrills, girls, and (yes) rock n' roll, gets off on having this cool, party-girl new mom. Well, at least for awhile. There's probably a reason that mom couldn't handle having a kid when she was so young, and she hasn't exactly grown into the most responsible parent-figure as an adult, either.

Beatlemaniacs may chomp at the bit for more, well, Beatles stuff (Like the tease of: Ooo! There's The Cavern! ... but only from the outside), but as a character study, Nowhere Boy is certainly worth watching. Aaron Johnson, because he is a fresh and unfamiliar face, is convincing as a good kid that is kind of bad, who really just wants to reconnect with his flake of a mom. Kristin Scott Thomas once again proves she is the Queen of Frost, who can melt when you find her heart. And, I have to say, whoever decided to cast Kristin Scott Thomas and Anne-Marie Duff as sisters... brilliant! Duff is certainly not an ideal mother-figure, and she is royally screwed up, but she still manages to make her character sympathetic in this curious mother/son story.