Storm Boy

ANDY’S RATING:

FRIENDLY pelican Mr Percival is a national hero in Australia, where Colin Thiele’s

1964 children’s book and its 1976 movie adaptation are mainstays of primary school education.

This new version has Geoffrey Rush as Michael Kingley, a company director about to make a deal with a big bad mining company.

While he mulls it over he tells his 17-yearold grandchild (Morgana Davies) all about his youth.

The core, and the heart, of this version is in the 1950s and involves lonely 11-year-old Mike (Finn Little) living in a shack on a beach with his gentle but emotionally damaged father Tom (Jai Courtney).

When hunters kill a flock of pelicans, the boy discovers three hatchlings in an empty nest and raises them to adulthood.

One, Mr Percival, becomes a loyal family pet.

At times the tone feels a bit mournful for a kids’ film, but little Little is charming and the live-action pelicans are a delight.