Plot: The desert town of Baxter, California has a population of 87 and is built on the failed dreams of Blue Baxter’s (Brendan Sexton III) late father. Blue attempts to keep his father’s dream alive by working on the ocean park that happens to be nowhere near an ocean. Blue’s friends are marginally supportive of this attempt but acceptance of quirky behavior is a staple in every rural town. Pete (Casey Affleck) plans on winning a local ORV race and his girlfriend Ely (Christina Ricci) blows stuff up.

To make Blue’s life complicated, Sky (Kate Hudson) arrives in town with her Pop Culture professor father (John Heard). Sky is a teen actress on a cable program Blue has never seen before, because cable doesn’t go as far as Baxter and his mom won’t get a satellite dish because the aliens will know where she lives. I lived in a place like that once in my life.

Some mysterious circumstances surface. First the accidental hotel fire in which Blue’s father died appears to have been the work of arson. Then a local cola-bottling tanker semi jack-knifes and spills its load. The FBI (Michael Ironside gets to play a bad guy. Again) are called in for a Haz Mat clean up but seem to have trouble identifying the substance and quarantine the town.

Things begin to get dicey when time passes and the town remains isolated. The story shuffles from how kids live their lives in a rural community, to how people react when cut off from the world by human forces beyond their control.

The Good: I liked the performances in this movie and I liked the actors. They were readily believable in the movie and there was good interaction and direction. That’s the best part of the movie. Some unexpected story elements kept interest going.

The Bad: For everything contained in the plot it seemed like the movie dragged or was too long. Maybe it was that there was too much happening and the story ended up with too many characters. Whatever the cause this movie doesn’t quite make it.

Bottom Line: Not quite as boring to watch about the lives of rural teens as it would have been to live them.

Rating: 2 cocktails.