Timberlake, young co-star appealing in “Palmer,” debuting on Apple TV+
You don’t notice “Palmer” getting its hooks into you.
The new drama starring music superstar Justin Timberlake and debuting on Apple TV+ this week is a rather bland work for roughly its first half.
Fine. But bland.
After that, though, you realize you’ve become invested — quite invested — less so with Timberlake’s titular character, Eddie Palmer, than with the unusual young boy for whom he is caring: Ryder Allen’s Sam.
(Note that Denver singer-songwriter Nathaniel Rateliff wrote and performed the song “Redemption” for “Palmer.”)
Seven-year-old Sam likes things tradi
tionally favored by girls: princesses and tea parties topping the list. And he likes them a lot.
Of course, that makes him a target of bullies, big and small, young and old, because some people fear what they do not understand.
You expect Eddie, who prefers “Palmer,” to have a problem with this, too. The onetime star high school quarterback rolls back into his small Louisiana hometown after time in prison. He seems like the simple, quiet type.
Arriving by bus, he comes to the house owned by Vivian (June Squibb, “Nebraska”), the grandmother who raised him. As long as he’s living there, she tells him, he will accompany her to church every Sunday. (And don’t make the woman late for the service or you’ll get an earful.)
The house also soon is temporarily home to Sam, whose mother, Shelly (Juno Temple of Apple TV+ gem “Ted Lasso”), skipped town after a quick late-night hook-up with Palmer. She is a drug addict who has a habit of vanishing, and Sam seems happy to be in the house next to his mom’s trailer and, at one point, works to “spice” up Vivian’s hair.
Palmer doesn’t understand Sam’s effeminate behavior — “You know you’re a boy, right?” he asks Sam early on, getting a “yeah” in response — but he’s got bigger problems. Most importantly, he needs to find employment, which will keep him on the good side of his parole officer.
As the film progresses, Palmer becomes a more-significant part of Sam’s life and a protector to the boy. He may not understand the kid, but he believes Sam should be allowed to be who he wants to be.
That is a belief shared by
Sam’s kind-hearted teacher, Maggie (Alisha Wainwright, “Shadowhunters”), who obviously will become a love interest for our protagonist.
On the one hand, it feels as if
Palmer’s character arc should have a bigger curve to it. He’s more willing to take on responsibility by the end than he is initially, but he’s largely the same person throughout the film. However, it’s nice that the screenplay from Cheryl Guerriero (“Pledge This!”) — whose Twitter bio suggests it took more than a decade for this script to become a movie — defies our expectations for how Palmer will behave toward Sam.
Director Fisher Stevens, who mostly has made documentaries (“Before the Flood,” “Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds”), takes a less-is-more approach here that pays off by the end.
Here and there, “Palmer” has what feels to be a strange editing choice — a couple of scene transitions aren’t the smoothest — but that doesn’t come close to taking away from the pleasure of watching the film.
In the starring role, Timberlake (“Friends With Benefits,” “Trouble With the Curve”) reminds you of another leading man with a pop-music background: Mark Wahlberg. Now, Timberlake may be capable of greater range than Wahlberg has shown in his myriad star turns, but he’s not asked to show it here. But what he is asked to do — be the generally steady-if-capable-of-great-anger ex-con — he does quite well.
However, it’s the young newcomer, Allen, who steals the show. He helps make Sam such a sweet and likeable kid — Sam looks up to Palmer long before the latter takes a shine to him — that you can’t help but to become wholly invested in the character.
Like Palmer, you worry about what Sam’s interests will mean for him in terms of acceptance and bullying, but you, too, want him to act as he likes.
To the credit of all involved, even though you’re pretty sure you’re right about how this story willend—andevenifitdoesso a little clunkily — “Palmer” has its hooks so deeply in you by then that you very much want to be right.