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Mr.Cranky ! 1. You and some other critics on this site mention nudity of the two main characters ("..features full frontal male nudity, a ten-year-old girl taking off her shirt..") well yes, so what. None of this would have come to my mind, if I had you recap the story, they are not important enough ! Besides, nudity in a film, is that something negative ??? I really wonder why in the USA nudity seems to be still (21 century!) a problem... The fact, that in this film the father of the girl had a loaded (!) gun in his car, unlocked and reachable for his little daughter -on the other hand- is too normal to be mentioned- but that`s the main topic of this film: The craziness of the normal. 2. You mentioned the abundance of irreverence and wackyness in this film. Irreverence against what ? Wackyness ? who is wacky in this film ? Your review lacks the explanation. (Maybe this film tries to show the wackyness of some "normal" (conformistic-to-the-power darwinistic-to-the poor) way of living...?) 3. But maybe there is to much of all in this film, which tries to be modern-fairy-tale-poetry AND social criticism. If you take it as a social criticism it much too black-and-white in its over-simplification (poor but good AND honest AND warmhearted AND superhuman-in-his-self-conrtol AND Young AND good-looking fellow AGAINST rich AND mean-looking/beeing AND arrogant MONEY&POWER-Worshipers... (for me, but maybe I am wrong since I don't know this suburbal white "ghettos" ..) Its a pathetical film too, the scene where Trents father wheezes because of a missing half of a lung lost as an aftermath of the vietnam/(or korean) war was musically "supported" by "Knocking on heavens door" ! Or was that irony ? For me interessting was the fact, that this father was still sort of a patriot whereas Trent, the son hated - what ? the US-Flag, yes - the government, that he blames to have fed his father in full knowledge with spoiled food thus causing his agononizingly slow death, maybe. But Trent does not rant against this all, he has not turned criminal, he does not (?) hate e.g. the "system", (this you might rather see in european films) maybe he knows the futility of such feelings, maybe he is still a believer in the american dream (success by honest, hard work) ?? 4. Finally, do I recommend this film ? Yes, its an interesting fim, although it tries to say to much - comparable in a way to Kusturicas "Arizona Dreams"
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