Movie review: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

Everyone surely remembers where they were when terrorism struck New York and the World Trade Center's Twin Towers came tumbling down.

It was a truly surreal moment that still seems more like the stuff of Hollywood than reality.

Ten years on and the first major film reflecting on the disaster has hit our screens.

But Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is so much more than a retelling of the disaster - it is an incredibly poignant story of a young boy trying to deal with the tragic lost of his precious father. Oskar Schell (Thomas Horn) is a quirky young boy with autistic-like symptoms who shared an extremely close bond with his father, Thomas (Tom Hanks).

When Thomas is caught up in the 9/11 tragedy, Oskar is beyond distraught.

The one person who gets him is gone. All he has to remember his father by is a few mementoes and the answering machine with his dad's final anxious messages after the terror attack.

Oskar is looking for something to keep his father alive in his mind.

Snooping around his father's closet, Oskar discovers a key and a name: "Black". He thinks his father has left him a puzzle with a mystery reward at the end if he can find the hole the key fits.

And so begins his journey of discovery across the boroughs of New York city. Along for the ride is his grandmother's boarder, "The Renter" (Academy Award nominee Max von Sydow).

In a bizarre way, they form a tight bond as The Renter helps Oskar move past some of his hang-ups.

Fighting his instinctive reluctance to talk to people, Oskar seeks out and finds hundreds of people with the name Black across the city. He shares his heart-warming story with each one of them and seeks answers.

But although he makes wonderful friends, he gets no nearer to unlocking the mystery.

Only when all hope appears lost does an unexpected piece of information come his way.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is not destined to be a mainstream box-office hit. But it is a magnificent movie that tackles the issues of 9/11 and autism with delicacy and warmth.

It provides a moving insight into what life must have been like for New York families during and after that catastrophic day.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

Running time: 129 minutes

Stars: 4.5  / 5