Silent Roar

Dondo is a young surfer. His fisherman dad Willy disappeared a year ago. No sign of his boat, nor his body. Dondo’s mother and the community know Willy has not survived a year in the Atlantic. But Dondo thinks differently.

There is certainly some beautiful photography of the Hebrides here, but otherwise the film seems uncertain as to what it’s trying to do. It follows the tale of the young “Dondo” (Louis McCartney) who lives with his mum (Victoria Belnaves) as both come to terms with an anniversary. It’s not a joyous one, though, as his dad has been lost at sea and the youngster refuses to believe the worst. With much of the ensuing storyline blurred between his actual existence and a more imaginary - or idealistic - one in which his love of surfing and a new-found faith in God prevail, the plot tries to understand a little about how “Dondo” deals with an incomplete grieving process. Meantime, he has hormones too as does neighbour “Sas” (Ella Lily Hyland) and though neither acknowledges their attraction, their friendship does start to help him to focus. That focus is brought to an head when his mum decides that she needs some sort of closure in the form of a memorial to be led by their local pastor “Paddy” (Mark Lockyer). At times it is quite a poignant study of just how difficult it can be to come to terms with tragedy when there are no concrete terms of reference to anchor those feelings of loneliness and isolation, but I think a lot of that emanates from the audience’s own sympathies for an engagingly portrayed character rather than because auteur Jonny Barrington has written or directed anything that imposes on us. Indeed, the whole film relies too heavily on the scenery, a little dark humour and lots of assumptions to sell itself and I’m afraid I found that - and the teenage angst relationship sub-plot - just a bit underwhelming. It’s a good starting point to tell the story, but in the end is incomplete as the dilemma facing “Dondo”.