Movie Review: 'Ocean Boy' is a Beautiful Movie to Look At

Ocean Boy (2023)

Directed by Tyler Atkins

Written by Tyler Atkins

Starring Luke Hemsworth, Rasmus King

Release Date February 3rd, 2023

Published February 1st, 2023

Ocean Boy, or Bosch and Rockit in many other, non-American markets, is an Australian crime, surfing and family drama. The film stars the Zeppo of the Hemsworth clan, Luke Hemsworth as Bosch, a farmer and small-time drug kingpin. Bosch sells weed and does pretty well with it. His crime empire is threatened when a corrupt cop tries to force Bosch to start selling cocaine. Bosch is, at the very least, smart enough to recognize the dangers of selling cocaine versus the relative safety of sticking with pot.

Meanwhile, Bosch's teenage son, Rockit, is basically feral. Though being 13 or 14 years old, Rockit can't read. All Rockit ever wants to do is surf and or, hang out on the beach. At school, on the rare occasion that he goes to school, Rockit is mocked and mistreated by his schoolmates. His teachers are not much better as they've clearly not bothered to actually try to teach the kid, preferring to pass him from grade to grade without question.

The plot of Ocean Boy truly kicks in when a wildfire destroys Bosch's crops, and he loses the cocaine that he was supposed to sell. Going on the run with his son, Bosch tries to put a positive spin on things by convincing his son that they are simply on holiday and camping on the beach in a resort town. This lie can only carry things so far and soon, father and son are deeply at odds. Meanwhile, the baddies are hot on Bosch's trail. The cocaine he lost was very expensive and the corrupt cops want their money back.

That's the basic bones of Ocean Boy but the film's bread and butter, its best element, is gorgeous surfing cinematography. Young Rasmus King is a supremely talented surfer and writer-director Tyler Atkins takes good advantage of his young star's talent. What King lacks in terms of acting talent, he more than makes up for in presence and surfing talent. The kid is legitimately fantastic in terms of his surfing prowess, and I enjoyed any time the kid was on a surfboard.

I've been hard on Luke Hemsworth during his checkered career as the least well known Hemsworth brother, referring to him as the Zeppo of the Hemsworth family, and so on, but he's really not bad here. The character of Bosch is a little underwritten and he does his best to give the character a soul. Sadly, he's no match for a movie in which the director is more interested in his visual artistry than in telling a satisfying story with well-rounded characters. The choices made by just about every character in the movie are either mind numbing in their simplicity or wildly inappropriate for the story being told.

When Ocean Boy is off the water, the film is a rather bland bit of melodrama. The crime story is dismissed with a simplistic resolution and the family drama is bitter but not in any memorable way. The surfing is great. Ocean Boy is a beautiful film. Director of Photography Ben Nott and Underwater Photographer Shane Fletcher are the MVP's of Ocean Boy. The surfing is so lovingly captured and many of the scenes set at sunrise and sunset are so lovely that I don't want to simply dismiss Ocean Boy as a minor melodrama.

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