I’m glad it is easy to approve of Hoot, for disapproving of the movie would mean disapproving of a host of good-natured things, including cute owls and the cuter kids who try to save them. Adapted from the Carl Hiaasen novel, Hoot follows a budding teen (Logan Lerman) whose family has just moved from Montana to Florida, where he connects with a stepbrother and stepsister who have waged a guerilla war against the developers of a new pancake house to be built atop a colony of burrowing owls. On hand to personify the hippy-dippy vibe of the project is Jimmy Buffett, who plays a science teacher and provides a handful of original tunes. Hoot goes down as easily as one of those ditties – it’s the cute kiddie version of an environmental protest song.
