WATCH THE FILM

PRESS

"Littlerock tells a confident story that knows precisely where it's going."
-Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times 

"There's a melancholy to this indie's cross-cultural explorations and communication breakdowns that compensates for the broader swipes."
David Fear, Time Out 

"An ethereal and ephemeral musing on the art and artifice of communication."
Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times 

“Littlerock isn't a film weighed down by symbolism, and to misconstrue it as such would divert us from its small, idiosyncratic pleasures.”
-Michael Sicinski, Cinema Scope 

“Ott has explored his theme - how each person's destiny is propelled by the past but left dangling, isolated in a seemingly formless present - with great subtlety.”
-Tom Keogh, Seattle Times 

"A neatly plotted, observational film about being on the outside looking in, and on the inside looking out."
-Burl Burlingame, Honolulu Star-Advertiser 

“A restrained but visually arresting film about the various ways in which we reach out to one another, often to no avail.”
-Michael Nordine, Film Threat 

"Ott's distilled the town until it floats somewhere between a hangover and a dream."
-Wesley Morris, Boston Globe

"Expectations are subverted, assumptions exploded, and the meaningless nature of words is replaced by the importance of conversation."
-Andrea Chase, Killer Movie Reviews

"This evocative, deceptively rich slice of life has its own voice, and it never fails to be enjoyable for several reasons."
-David Lewis, San Francisco Chronicle 

"Atsuko the character doesn't speak English; Atsuko the actress, speaking mostly un-subtitled Japanese when she speaks at all, gives a performance that's a marvel of nonverbal reaction."
-Karina Longworth, Village Voice 

Director Mike Ott's second narrative feature cannily plays its intentions close to the vest.
-Bill Weber, Slant Magazine 

"A character-driven cross-cultural drama about the adolescent quest for new experiences and the realization of the mysteries that lie behind relationships and reality."
-Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality & Practice 

"Ott captures with subtlety, wit, and irony the points of view of both the Japanese visitors and the local yokels."
-Peter Keough, Boston Phoenix 

"Littlerock wins your involvement by its meandering off-handedness and refusal to play up its strangers-in-a-strange-land conceit."
-James Adams, Globe and Mail 

"A nicely pitched filmic playlet on how others see us, Littlerock puts Middle America under a microscope and breathes life into the mundane."
-Jim Slotek, Jam! Movies 

"Ott's knack for telling observations and beguiling ambiguities make him a director to watch."
-Jason Anderson, eye WEEKLY