Uproar ***Coming-of-age stories come in all shapes and sizes—as do the people they’re about—so it’s interesting to see this one approaching the idea of developing a social consciousness at a time when you’d rather just be invisible. The story is set in 1981 New Zealand, where Josh Waaka (Julian Dennison) is a half-Maori high-schooler at a predominantly White private school. Turmoil is hitting the rugby-mad country as the South African rugby team tours New Zealand, inspiring sympathetic protests over the apartheid system, and how close it hits home in another country mistreating its indigenous population. Directors/co-writers Paul Middleditch and Hamish Bennett (working with a larger writing team) also include a sub-plot involving Josh’s growing interest in theater, and it’s part of a narrative that at times feels a bit over-stuffed, including the difficulties faced by Josh’s widowed single mom (Minnie Driver) and his injured rugby-star brother (James Rolleston). But Dennison makes Josh a great protagonist in his self-deprecating wit and his emerging realization that the world is bigger than his desire to avoid drawing attention to himself. The result is a mostly-charming, sometimes challenging recognition of the different points in our lives when we can all learn, in the words of the late John Lewis, when to make “good trouble.” Available March 22 in theaters. (PG-13)

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