There’s a healthy respect for the craft of writing in this story of a reclusive author (Sean Connery) who mentors an underprivileged but talented teen-ager (Rob Brown) in the Bronx, but things turn arch and silly fast. Director Gus Van Sant gives in to all of the treacly contrivances he avoided in the similarly themed Good Will Hunting, while Connery harrumphs about in hope of an Oscar nomination (for some reason, the actor’s brogue seems to get thicker with age).
