57
It’s there that a psychologist (Linda
Fiorentino) urges him to revisit his
childhood, and as the details of his life
as a child actor emerge in flashback, you
begin to understand why he’s not just
an alcoholic but also kind of a jerk: the
young Otis (played, by Noah Jupe, with
just the right amount of precociousness)
is being raised in a depressing housing
complex by his father James (LaBeouf),
a former rodeo clown with a receding
hairline and low self-esteem.
What makes Honey Boy work is that
Otis never wallows in his circumstances;
like many kids raised in abusive house-
holds, he becomes a caretaker of sorts,
intuiting that in the end he’ll be O.K. But
it’s LaBeouf ’s performance as his
father that haunts the movie. He’s
hateful, but even within the con-
text of this upbringing-as-horror-
show, LaBeouf locates crystal-
line reflections of the better
man his father might have
been. His performance
both exorcises a demon
and makes peace with it,
which may be a better
gift than his father de-
serves. But then, it’s the
giving that counts.HONEY BOY opens in theaters
Nov. 8movieS baSed on real-life child-
hood trauma are always dicey. How is
the audience supposed to know how to
react to them? If you don’t buy the kid’s
suffering, you just feel heartless, as if
someone has spilled his deepest secrets
and all you can muster is a shrug.
But Honey Boy, written by and star-
ring Shia LaBeouf and based on his own
life as a child performer, never paints
its audience into that corner. LaBeouf
wrote the script during his time in court-
mandated rehab for substance abuse, fol-
lowing a 2017 arrest. The director, a doc-
umentarian making her feature debut, is
Alma Har’el. LaBeouf emailed her a draft
of the script from rehab, as if sending out
a message in a bottle. The film the
two have made together is enter-
taining and wrenching.
LaBeouf ’s stand-in character
is Otis, whom we first meet as an
adult, played by Lucas Hedges.
He’s a Famous Actor, cocky
and overbearing but also a
model of proficiency when
the cameras are rolling.
Yet he’s lost when they
stop: he drinks, he drives,
he does crazy stuff. Dur-
ing a drunken spree, he
crashes a car and talks back to
the arresting officer. Soon he’s
in rehab.
MOVIES
Moviemaking as therapy
By Stephanie Zacharek
TELEVISION
Charli’s angelsCharli XCX is your favorite
pop star’s favorite pop star—a
27-year-old English musician and
songwriter who’s already racked
up three studio albums; a slew
of singles, EPs and mixtapes;
and over a decade in the music
industry. She’s a sought-after
collaborator with a futuristic,
avant-pop sensibility; even if
you don’t know her biggest hit,
2014’s “Boom Clap,” you’ve
almost certainly heard her on
smashes like Iggy Azalea’s
“Fancy” and Icona Pop’s “I Love
It.” Now, Charli expands into TV.
Netflix’s reality series I’m
With the Band: Nasty Cherry
has the singer playing mentor
and impresario to an all-female
rock group apparently culled
from her personal contacts.
The (atrociously named) four-
piece moves into a cheeky-chic
home in Los Angeles, where the
women are tasked with building
a local reputation through wild
house parties as much as
through their performances.
There’s ample intraband drama
as two experienced musicians
and two novices struggle to get
on the same page; the guitarist
is torn between her old band
and Nasty Cherry. Yet beyond
providing Charli’s no-nonsense
advice, the show is a pleasure
to watch, because it breaks
from the competitive structure
of forerunners like Making the
Band, bearing witness to the
joyous, rarely documented
sight of women making music
together. —Judy BermanI’M WITH THE BAND: NASTY
CHERRY premieres on Netflix
Nov. 15LaBeouf, below, plays his own father in the semiautobiographical Honey Boy