The Wilson family consists of dad Hollis ("Breaking Bad"'s Aaron Paul, in yet another remarkable performance) and the two aforementioned sons. The mother has died, leaving behind an abyss in her wake, as well as her fragile dream that re-locating to Galveston will somehow give the family a fresh start. Hollis continues to invest in his dead wife's dream, driving the 40 miles to Galveston to work on their wrecked house (already in foreclosure). In the meantime, his two sons rage free, completely unmonitored. It's not that Hollis doesn't love his sons. He does. But his own grief and loss, not to mention alcoholism, has made him incapable of caring for them or himself.

13-year-old Jacob is first seen trashing a pickup truck outside a football stadium with his group of buddies he calls "the crew". Metallica and Slayer and other heavy metal monsters grind through the soundtrack, providing a violent, driving subtext to the often-melancholy scenes. Jacob is basically in charge of his younger brother, and he takes that as seriously as a 13-year-old boy can take it. But he is too young to be a caretaker; he favors Wonder Bread with whipped cream and sugar for lunch, and he has already been placed in a juvenile detention program, threatened with being locked up for the rest of his adolescence if he doesn't get his act together. Worryingly, Jacob starts to involve Wes in the criminal nighttime outings of "the crew".

Hollis, taken up with his own pain, and perhaps residual guilt about descending into a drunken stupor following his wife's death, is seemingly unaware of just how bad things have gotten. His house is a total mess. Beer cans pile up on the counter. He gives Jacob a talking-to about "the crew," but still disappears for days at a time, leaving the boys unattended. His dead wife's sister, Pam (Juliette Lewis), is concerned. She tries to talk to Jacob, but there is little she can actually do.

"Hellion" covers familiar ground, but it feels fresh. The film doesn't propose solutions, and it doesn't soft-pedal the fact that Hollis is dropping the ball on his responsibilities. Part of the freshness has to do with the acting, particularly of young Josh Wiggins. He is the center of the film, and he gives a full-blown, beautifully intricate and wrenching performance, completely confident in all of its aspects, not showing any whiff of amateurism. He is tender, thoughtful, pissed off, wild, and completely not dealing with how much he misses his mother. He doesn't seem like a "child actor." Or an actor at all. You wonder, "Where on earth did they find this boy?" There is a painful confrontation scene between Jacob and his father at a crowded pizza joint that is pierced through with such agony on the part of Wiggins that all you want to do is race in and save him. And when CPS shows up to take Wes out of the house, the scene that follows is terrible to witness, both children screaming and writhing around in the arms of the police officers, fighting to stay together. It's extraordinary.

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