He is David. We are bored. It's a shame.
Because I Am David has the story potential for a powerful film, and squanders it on a particularly intense, particularly incompetent Disney-esque disappointment. But don't blame Disney. This is a Lions Gate flop.
Larded with nearly laughably stiff acting and stunted direction—laughable if not servicing such a gut-wrenching premise—David is adapted from the novel by Anne Holm. In 1952, a 12-year-old boy (Ben Tibber) escapes from the Bulgarian labor camp that's been his only home, with instructions (from a voice-over) to travel across Europe and deliver a mysterious letter to someone in some place called Denmark.
And so commences (no disrespect intended) The Adventures of Benji, brave child subbing for spunky mutt.
Without a word of debate, and in the episodic cadence of a TV flick, David: deftly escapes, dodges nasty camp guards, scales electrified fences, stows away aboard a ship, goes overboard, dog-paddles to shore from the middle of the ocean, walks forlornly in a downpour, meets rigidly quirky characters who immediately pay him intense attention, falls into the good graces of a rich family, is smitten with their daughter, heroically rescues same daughter from a fire, and finally finds the elderly woman who will take him the rest of the way on his physical/emotional trek to personal freedom. In a climax with whopping credibility problems. To a relentless, intrusive soundtrack that could tell the entire tale without benefit of moving images.
Phew.
It all unfolds with the precision of a drumbeat and—excepting several brutal flashbacks to David's memories of the camp—not one moment feels lifelike.
Tibber, his heartbreaking young face etched in deep sadness, carries the proceedings admirably, but the film's stacked against him.
In supporting turns, two pros deliver. Jim Caviezel is haunting as David's labor-camp mentor, who looks like he's not only lived through hell but actually experienced it, too, even though he's forced to whisper dialogue like, "If you stay alive, you can change things. If you're dead, you can't." And Joan Plowright, twinkly as ever, is a pleasure to spend cinematic time around.
But I Am David isn't a journey through emotional discovery. It's a journey through a script. A bad one.