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Before he gets to work on the third Thor movie, New Zealand director Taika Waititi finished his latest film, Hunt for the Wilderpeople. The film is a mix of absurdist comedy, buddy movie and heartfelt coming-of-age movie all rolled into one.
The film starts with 13-year-old and all around do-badder Ricky Baker (Julian Dennison) arriving at the isolated home of Hec (Sam Neill) and his wife Bella (Rima Te Wiata). Child protective services has no idea what to do about him and this is Ricky’s last chance to live with a family. At first, he’s apprehensive and tries to run away, but eventually learns to love Hec and Bella.
One day, Bella sadly dies and Ricky decides to run away for good, assuming that he knows the New Zealand bush trails better than Hec. Even though he hates the kid, Hec decides to go after him. When CPC gets wind of this, they think Hec has done something criminal, sparking a manhunt for the two.
Waititi, who wrote the script based on a novel by Barry Crump, injects the film with enough humor to make sure that this doesn’t feel like a repeat of other on-the-run movies. It succeeds thanks to its unexpected mix of cliches from chase movies and coming-of-age stories. We don’t expect these to mix, but the life lessons Ricky learns along the way are so seamlessly interwoven into the story that we don’t realize that we’ve seen this stuff before. We’ve all seen Old Yeller moments when a beloved dog must be shot. Jokes about how older people just don’t get music these days are everywhere. For Waititi, though, these tropes are merely foundations he can play on.
These characters are also unconventional. Hec isn’t just a grumpy old man, thanks to Sam Neill’s scenery-chewing performance. He built such a fascinating rapport with youngster Julian Dennison that is realistic. Speaking of Dennison, he must have been created for a Waititi film. Dennison just gets the absurdist humor, delivering a constant stream of jokes. Rachel House, who prowls the bush like the Terminator (meaning that Ricky is Sarah Connor before she did pull-ups), is much funnier than expected. She’s like Jackie Gleason in Smokey and the Bandit, although she usually leaves her vehicle.
Hunt for the Wilderpeople might not do anything new with plot, but the way the story is told makes it an engrossing adventure. Waititi knows how to handle humor and understand what you need to make it work. Even though Wilderpeople does run a little on the long side, the heart at its center makes it an unexpected pleasure.