The Mudge Boy

Writer-director Michael Burke fleshed out his acclaimed 20-minute short "Fishbelly White" into this heartfelt feature about an adolescent farm boy grappling simultaneously with the loss of his beloved mother and his confused longing for an older boy. Left alone with his withdrawn father (Richard Jenkins) after his mother suffers a fatal heart attack, teenaged Duncan Mudge (Emile Hirsch) sublimates his grief by tending to the chickens he and his mother raised together. His loneliness is compounded by the fact that his father barely acknowledges his presence and most of the townies think he's strange; they call him "Chicken Boy," "Pumpkin" or simply "The Mudge Boy." Wi...