2004’s Mean Creek is one of those films that makes me cry every time.

The story that it tells is, at first glance, a rather simple one.  It’s only as you start to dig beneath the surface that you discover just how complex the film really is.  Sam (Rory Culkin) is being picked on by the school bully, the overweight George (Josh Peck).  When Sam accidentally knocks over George’s video camera while George is filming himself playing basketball, George beats Sam up.

Sam’s older brother Rocky (Trevor Morgan) decided to get revenge and recruits two of his friends to help him out, Clyde (Ryan Kelly) and Marty (Scott Mechlowicz).  Their plan is to invite George to Sam’s birthday party and to take him on a rafting trip.  Eventually, they plan to challenge him to truth or dare, get him to strip naked, and then basically abandon him.

Needless to say, things don’t quite go as planned.

For one thing, it turns out that George is sincerely happy to have been invited to Sam’s party and he even shows up with a gift. George, it turns out, doesn’t consider himself to be a bully.  Instead, he’s just an overweight kid who is insecure about his dyslexia and who doesn’t have any social skills.  Once the boys and Sam’s girlfriend Millie (Carly Schroeder) are floating down the creek, they’re forced to reconsider their plans. Some want to forget about it and let George go.  Some want to still go through with the plan.

And, meanwhile, poor George continues to be his own worst enemy…

Mean Creek is a fascinating film because George is such an unexpectedly complex character.  When we first see him, it’s easy to dismiss him as just your standard middle school bully but, as the film progresses, it becomes apparent that there’s more to George than our first impressions may have suggested.  And yet, every time that we start to feel truly sorry for George, he says the wrong thing or he displays some sort of behavior that reminds us of why he was invited to the birthday party in the first place.  In the end, we’re as conflicted about him as everyone else on the boat.  He’s a bully but he’s not a bad kid.  Can we forgive him for being a bully or does he still need to be taught a lesson?

That’s the question at the heart of Mean Creek and the film’s final answer (or, perhaps I should say, lack of a final answer) makes me cry every time.  I don’t want to spoil the film for those who haven’t seen it (and everyone should see it), so I’m not going to give any more details about the film’s plot.  I’ll just say that Mean Creek is an important film and one that will leave you thinking about what you’ve just seen and how you feel about it.