All the Wilderness

Ultimately amounts to a visually ambitious tone poem about the none-too-surprising caprices of male adolescence.

Affected and slow, and more concerned with mood than plot, this moony first feature from Michael Johnson uses its Portland, Ore., setting as a canvas for mapping a course from isolation to companionship.

"All the Wilderness" seems tailor-made to play to the actor's strengths - Johnson's script is as lean as Smit-McPhee, both proving adept at doing more with less.

Though performances and tech credits are all first rate (not to mention a great soundtrack), this type of familial despondency, that requires its main protagonist to make peace with personal tragedy, is overly familiar and, at times, painstakingly cliché.