This movie, based on the book by Louis Sachar, was very odd.
Shia LeBeouf stars as Stanley Yelnats, a teenage boy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. While walking home from school one day, a pair of sneakers comes sailing and hits him on the head. His dad is a scientist, working on a formula for foot odor, and so he picks up the shoes, thinking his dad can use them. However, it turns out the shoes were donated to a homeless shelter by a famous basketball player as a fundraiser, and as Stanley was the one to be found holding them, the law decided to throw the book at him.
He is sent to a harsh juvenile detention facility where all day, every day, the boys are made to dig holes five feet deep by five feet across. They are out in the middle of the desert, with scorpions and poisonous lizards, and insane guards. They are severely punished for the slightest thing.
As the boys dig, if they come across anything “interesting,” they are to report immediately to the warden (Sigourney Weaver) who’s just as batty as her guards are. It turns out that a treasure has been buried somewhere on that land, and she devised the whole juvenile camp thing to come up with a way to excavate the entire property without having to hire men or equipment.
As Stanley’s story is played out, we get to see snippets of the past, first of Stanley’s great-great-grandfather, and also of the people who lived in the area where the boys are now digging. A rather sweet love story took place there between a black farmer and a pretty young schoolteacher. Forbidden to marry because of their different races, she turns to a life of crime and becomes a full-fledged outlaw.
This movie had some comical and some heart-touching moments, and I’m not saying you should write it off altogether. But you do need to know that the discipline enforced at this camp is harsh. I wouldn’t recommend the film for a child under the age of twelve, personally.
This film is rated PG.
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