‘Extremely’ dramatic and ‘Incredibly’ moving

In theaters Friday: The Grey, Man on a Ledge, One for the Money, We Need to Talk about Kevin [limited]

New on Blu-ray/DVD: 50/50, Real Steel, Paranormal Activity 3, Restless

Oskar Schell is the definition of precocious. Too witty and bookish by half, at the age of 12 the young Manhattanite resembles an overly reclusive college student, the kind that learns more than anyone but wouldn’t ever know it because he only ventures out of the dorm for class or the library. Oskar busies himself with a dozen hobbies and interests, and when he’s not studying entomology, creating jewelry or folding origami, he dreams up surreally complex inventions—most designed to protect people or animals from harm.

His father Thomas died inside the World Trade Center on 9/11, and the new film Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, adapted from Jonathan Safran Foers’ excellent sophomore novel of the same name, follows Oskar’s attempts to reconcile this senseless and pain-filled tragedy with the overly analytical nature of his budding brain.

He’s a precocious chatterbox, filled with so much trivia and ephemera precisely because the deep hole left by his father—the one hollowed out by the grief and longing he doesn’t yet understand—must be filled with something. So why not fill it with everything?

After finding a key in an envelope marked “Black” in his father’s closet, Oskar believes it is one final puzzle game his dad is playing with him and sets out across the city to find the right person with the last name “Black.” Someone out there has the lock to this key and will help him discover something new and lasting and powerful about his dead father, Oskar hopes. As Oskar becomes more and more obsessed with a key that has no lock in order to overcome a grief that has no solution, he meets a series of strangers including the reclusive mute renter across the street who may have a stronger connection to him than their street addresses.

Fledgling actor and former Jeopardy! Kids Week champion Thomas Horn brings the right balance of crippling fragility and know-it-all bravura to Oskar, his very first movie role. He has tantrums and smarts and meek, cuddled moments that all ring honest and noble and devastating. Director Stephen Daldry should be credited for shaping Horn’s performance as well as crafting a film that rides a fine line between heartache and melodrama. This is perhaps the most dangerous of traps, but the filmmaker who rose to prominence with 2000’s Billy Elliot has already proven his ability to help child actors find the truth in every scene.

Tom Hanks gives his most likeable performance in years as Oskar’s father. Seen in extensive flashbacks, Hanks is shown just enough to allow Oskar’s intensely specific depression at his loss believable while leaving the audience wanting more. We miss Thomas Schell almost as much as Oskar. Swedish actor Max von Sidow turns in a remarkably emotive performance as the renter across the street, and he does so without saying a word. Oskar invites him along on his quest, and the renter communicates using only a notepad and his hands tattooed with “yes” and “no,” respectively.

Though his father is dead, it is Oskar’s mother that he is truly distant from. Playing her reserved and emotionally cracked, Sandra Bullock in a role that stretches her typical rom-com persona. When Oskar’s search for a lasting connection with his father leads him to reconnect with his mother, the film’s point is driven home. Oskar is strong enough to live without his father. Doing so would make his dad proud. And, really, that’s all Oskar ever wanted to do.