A Home at the End of the World (2004)

The very little bit I know about the actor Colin Farrell is that he is a something of a lad and this has been underlined by the roles he has previously played.  Therefore his sensitive characterization in this film came as a revelation: the boy can act!  Based on a novel by a Pulitizer-Prize winning writer, this movie follows twelve years in a young man's life from the late 60s to the early 80s -- probably from about age nine or ten to his early twenties.  Bobby suffers a series of bereavements starting with the accidental death of his beloved elder brother.  After his parents also die, he finds a surrogate family with a high school friend (with whom exploratory sexual encounters begin) and especially with the boy's mother, played by Sissy Spacek.  Eventually he joins his pal in New York where the latter is living with an older hippy woman -- a rather worn-looking Robin Wright Penn (doing another remarkable acting job) and something of a menage a trois begins to form.  At this stage Farrell is playing a virgin which given his image is completely against type -- but totally believably done.  When she becomes pregnant (not that we are sure which of the two are the father) they move to the country and find a meaningful life together, although it is quite clear that Farrell is bisexual and that his friend otherwise inclined.  Further developments include her leaving with the child without knowing when and if she will return, the boys dealing with the death of the friend's father, and the intimation of AIDS on the horizon.  All in all a thoughtful and sensitively done film but in the end more sad than uplifting.