There are many films, especially low-budget independent films, which attract our attention during festivals, only to disappear afterwards without ever being released in the theater or on DVD. A few, however, that fly under the radar become sleeper hits, finding their audience and remaining popular for years. Such indeed may be the case with the charming Breakfast with Curtis. Written and directed by Laura Colella and winner of the Best Narrative and Best Ensemble Cast Awards at the Los Angeles Film Festival, Breakfast with Curtis is the story of a young boy's "seminal" summer that reminds us that community or large group support and interaction can often produce personal growth in a quicker and more lasting way than spending years talking to a psychiatrist.
The film is set in a suburban area outside of Providence, Rhode Island in the lazy summer months in a time not specified. 14-year-old Curtis (Jonah Parker) has no issues with the world in general. It's only other people that are the problem. To say he is introspective is like saying Don Corleone has a bunch of close friends. It's true but there's a lot more to the story. Curtis is so uncommunicative that he shuns school (is home-schooled), has no friends, and rarely even looks up when his parents talk to him.
Part of the reason he is so withdrawn is a traumatic incident that happened five years ago when next door neighbor Syd (Theo Green), a long-haired free spirit type who is an online bookseller, threatened to smash in his skull for throwing stuff at his cat. These terms of endearment did nothing to bring Curtis or his parents, dad Simon (David Parker) and mom Sylvie (Virginia Laffey) close to their neighbors and the hurt has been festering since then. The neighbors in this case are the communal-minded occupants of the three-story Victorian house next door to Curtis, known as the "Purple Citadel." They are, in fact, the director's actual friends and neighbors who have never acted before.
They include Syd's girlfriend, Pirate (Adele Parker) an artist who looks out for an older woman, Sadie (Yvonne Parker), who lives upstairs, Frenchy (Aaron Jungels) and Paola (Colella) who live on the third floor and spend a lot of time smoking pot and making love. In real life, they are teachers, artists, and software engineers. It's a fantasy, of course, but it would be nice if all of our neighbors could display such camaraderie and pleasure together, (without all the drinks and pot perhaps). The rapprochement with the neighbors starts taking shape when Syd, hearing that Curtis is good with computers, cautiously asks him to assist in a video project to further his online business, shooting tapes of Syd talking into the camera about himself and posting it on YouTube.
After much reluctance, Curtis agrees to help him and startling changes begin to take place in the young boy's life. Breakfast with Curtis has been called "unfocused," "amateurish," "plotless," "thin," and worse. It is probably all of the above (except for the "worse"), but what these critics leave out is that it is also a beautifully realized, touching, warm, funny, and downright lovely film and that Parker delivers the kind of commanding performance that only the best child actors can reach. Even grouches like myself will go home whistling.
