This Canadian import is a droll, slightly tart slice of PI whimsy.
That’s actually too superficial a description of writer/director Evan Morgan’s engaging feature film debut. At times, The Kid Detective seems to be taking place in a slightly existential universe not quite our own, where characters drop mordant one-liners without cracking a smile.
At other times, matters unexpectedly turn real-world serious, and emotions are real-world familiar.
When Abe (Adam Brody) and Caroline (Sophie Nélisse) realize they're being followed
by a dark sedan, they waver between two equally uncomfortable choices:
attempt to flee ... or confront.
It’s an intriguing balancing act, which — for the most part — Morgan skillfully navigates. He’s helped considerably by star Adam Brody’s morose, vulnerable and yet unexpectedly engaging performance as the rather unusual title character.
As an adolescent, Abe Applebaum (Jesse Noah Gruman) became a local celebrity in the cheerful little town of Willowbrook, Ontario, thanks to his facility for solving minor mysteries and wacky crimes. His successes resulted mostly from perception and an acute sense of psychology: the way people think and therefore act.
Partly out of respect — and likely also out of amusement — the townsfolk even set him up in a downtown office, where good friend Gracie Gulliver (Kaitlyn Chalmers-Rizzato) worked as receptionist. But then she disappeared one day. Despite Abe’s best efforts, and that of the local police, neither she — nor her body — ever was found.
This failure leaves Abe traumatized.
Now 32 (and played by Brody), Abe works out of the same office, stubbornly solving the same trivial cases — finding lost cats, and so forth — in between hangovers and raging attacks of self-pity. He has become the town joke, barely making ends meet; his frustrated parents (Wendy Crewson and Jonathan Whittaker) clearly have spent years trying to prod him into responsible adulthood.
Even Abe’s Goth receptionist (Sarah Sutherland, hilariously condescending) treats him with contempt.
Enter Caroline (Sophie Nélisse), a 16-year-old orphan who brings a real case, by asking his help in solving the brutal murder of her boyfriend, Patrick. Although initially wondering if she’s putting him on — we see the wary uncertainty in Brody’s gaze — Caroline is absolutely serious, her wide, guileless eyes radiating sincerity. And, indeed, Patrick was stabbed 17 times (!).
To say the subsequent investigation proceeds in fits and starts would be an understatement. Although his intuition remains sound, Abe’s sloppy appearance and occasionally reckless behavior hinder more than help. None of this shakes Caroline’s faith; indeed, she even drives him from one lead to the next — Abe doesn’t have a car — and becomes a de facto partner.
