Bobby Garfield is a boy (brilliantly acted by Anton Yelchin) growing up without his father in a small rural town where there seems to be nothing exciting to do. He does have good friends, and he is about to make a new one.

Bobby's attractive mother (Hope Davis who USA Today called "the indie-film world's intelligent blonde of choice") has money for a constant stream of new dresses but not for the bike of Bobby's dreams. Mrs. Garfield instead presents him with something that costs her nothing and blames it on the debts incurred by her late husband. She even misses his birthday dinner and phones him to tell him where the 'leftovers' are. Her complexity is such that one sympathizes with her (a widowed single woman in a male-dominated job market) and yet cannot actually bring oneself to respect her.

Ted Brautigan is a mysterious stranger who moves in upstairs with only two unmatched suitcases. There are moments when he seems to be elsewhere and talks of the haunting progress of "low men... in the Dickensian sense" - other strangers who are 'hot on his trail'. He hires Bobby to read the news to him and be his physical eyes. One senses he has other eyes and sees things at which the viewer can only guess. Sir Anthony Hopkins is outstanding in this role, bringing to it the requisite troubled gentleness combined with astute intellect and learning.

The story is based on two of the related short stories in a collection by Stephen King bearing the same title. The two stories are "Low Men in Yellow Coats" and "Why We're In Vietnam". The tale is both a dark and a bright one: A bright childhood in a decent place to grow up is darkened by Cold War events in the larger world and by psychological tension and foreboding. It is a deliciously ominous tale. Hopkins fans, King readers (This movie makes me want to read the book.), lovers of books, and those interested in conspiracy and the paranormal will find it of particular interest.

Certainly an unusual film, "Hearts in Atlantis" received a quiet reception in the theatres (it should be available on video by February 12th). Likewise it has been almost ignored when not bludgeoned unjustly by critics. At Rotten Tomatoes it is called "nothing more than a mood piece". Others summarized it as generally 'boring', 'heartless', 'unresolved' or "lugubrious".

There's no accounting for how easily someone is bored, or for what one considers "heart". If one made it through "A River Runs Through It" or "Legends of the Fall", let alone enjoyed them, one will at least not fall asleep during "Hearts in Atlantis."

If as resolution one expects an ending with neat and tidy answers, there is indeed much that is unresolved by the time the credits are rolling. Frankly, that is part of its brilliance. Indeed, much of the polarized moral conflict in 1960 (most of the story occurs during this year), and the questions it raised about a person's relationship to the state and to fellow persons, was and remains similarly unresolved. Why should a childhood of that era be any different? The film, in exploring adult-child friendship, asks us to ponder uncomfortable questions to which society has yet to provide omniscient answers.

If this interstitially spooky/beautiful/heartbreaking masterpiece had been shunted into the category of an "artsy" film, this would have been understood. Instead, it has been inappropriately marketed as a heartwarming idyllic tale and so is bound to disappoint anyone not looking for complex undercurrents and unsettled conflicts.

The film certainly is dark and mournful, but it is precisely the remembrance of friendship in tragedy, weakness, and injustice that underscores the depth of the film's relationships. For that depth one might be willing to bear some unhappiness. In the words of the film, "It isn't all Atlantis." Still, if one has "the heart of a lion..."

The film is given a PG-13 rating, possibly because of Mrs. Garfield's fears about pedophilia, heightened by the theme of rape, and for elements of juvenile violence.

The Hearts in Atlantis website is here Warnerbros.com. Multimedia interviews with director and cast can be viewed at Hollywood.com.