All right it’s time for a film that is definitely ambitious but I’m afraid that it fails on all accounts. When you see this film you immediately know that it’s not going places and I’m afraid that it never manages to make the comeback. This is a film that you definitely want to avoid. Instead of picking up this book to watch, read a classic book somewhere out there like Tim: Defender of Earth.

The movie starts by introducing us to Henry who is an absolute genius. The boy is still very young, yet he is an inventor, stock broker, and does whatever he has to. He is emotionally a little distant compared to other kids due to this but Henry has helped his family out a lot over the years. Unfortunately he has a big problem to get through now that won’t be easy. It turns out that his next door neighbor Glenn is actually a criminal who has been ruining his daughter Sheila’s life. Unfortunately he is the police chief and has a spotless record so nobody is doing anything about this and Sheila’s not really in a position to do anything either. Nobody except for Henry even suspects that something is going on since she rare has visible bruising. Henry decides that in order to save Sheila, he will have to murder Glenn.

Naturally this is a tough undertaking even for a genius like Henry. Additionally he has some medical issues going on as well and isn’t at peak strength. So he has to find a way to murder Glenn without leaving any evidence or causing his family trouble. His mother Susan enjoys playing a lot of shooters throughout the day and just having fun living life while his brother Peter is a normal kid and so he can’t keep up with these life and death stakes. In a way Henry is sort of on his own with this.

The kid genius characters can be a little hard to take seriously at times and I have to admit that this happens for this movie as well. It’s great to see Henry making his family rich and all but when he tries to be serious I just can’t take the scene quite as seriously. He’s a good kid though which is what counts even if he’s not a very interesting character. His brother Peter doesn’t get a lot to do here. He gets some development near the end as he tries his best to help out but his role in the film is effectively filler.

Susan gets a big role as the mother of course. It was a fresh change of pace to see the adult playing video games and having a good time. So often in these films you see the parents just doing work or reading a book but not having any kind of personality or hobbies. If there are hobbies it would be something like golf. So the video games was pretty fun. In a way her plot is about growing up though which goes against this and by the end you wonder if she will be having as much fun.

For obvious reasons within the film’s context she will be serious for a while but hopefully she still keeps up with gaming and all. The idea that it wouldn’t be a serious hobby is a bit dated if you ask me. Unfortunately she looks really bad near the end as the film makes one of the all time classic blunders. Let me put the scenario in this context. You are face to face with an unrepentant monster who is fully prepared to murder you. You have made it clear that his life will be over if he doesn’t murder you and both of you happen to be in the middle of nowhere in the dead of night with no witnesses.

Your only real options here are to murder him or be murdered. The film tries to present the argument for violence never being the way but does so in very sloppy fashion. By all logic Susan should have been obliterated in that scene. So I’d argue her whole climax is poorly written and makes her look like a really bad character. It’s a selfish decision first of all. If she gets bumped off there, then her kid is going to be in a lot of trouble and things will only get worse for Sheila.

It’s one thing if you’re being held at gunpoint to decide not to fight back and just be resigned to your death. It’s another if you have the opportunity to take the gun away and 3 hostages are behind you. The film definitely lost me here…well it lost me more than it already had. The climax is just really bad and there are many times where being a pacifist is straight up the wrong move. This is definitely one of those times.

I’d argue that in general getting drunk a lot at home to the point where the kids can predict it is irresponsible as well but I guess I won’t deduct as many points from her there. In theory at home should be the one place you can drink past your limit if that’s something you want to do. It doesn’t set up a great example, but that’s how it goes. Meanwhile her friend Sheila doesn’t really add much to the film either. Her scene with Henry just ends up being cringe and this felt like Peter where the film was adding a character to bloat the cast a bit even though she had nothing to do.

David gets a randomly rushed romance setup which makes no sense. You can’t really convince me that this would ever work as just seeing him should bring up bad memories for Susan every time. Then you have Christina who you just feel bad for the whole time. She really went through a lot and nobody was being particularly helpful for a while there. The fact that she hasn’t shut down completely and is able to keep up a nice attitude speaks volumes about her good character.

Then you have Glenn as the main villain who is basically just a character written to be super evil so there’s nothing to like there. You’re just rooting for his downfall the whole time. Still, it’s the subplot that destroys the film so in a way you could blame him for making the film no good. Without him I don’t think this would be a smash hit or anything but it would be considerably better. I would also change Henry’s ending a little bit as well and then the score would immediately be tripled. For a long while into the film I was expecting some kind of fakeout even if that would have been really hard to make convincing.

Overall, The Book of Henry is definitely a film that I would recommend staying away from. It ultimately fails by resorting to shock value with the dark Glenn plot as well as Henry’s plight. The film has so much drama and then the characters don’t react to it properly. Particularly with the first plot as there should have been a lot more urgency here and no getting cold feet at the end when you have the chance. The film isn’t always sure what kind of tone it wants to have and ultimately tends to make the wrong choices.

Overall 2/10