Hunter, Father

HUNTER, FATHER tells the story of Arlo, a blue-collar father trying to reconnect with his geeky teenage son Rhett over the course of a camping trip. Due to a custody battle at the heart of a drawn out divorce with Rhett’s mother, Arlo needs this trip to go well so that Rhet will speak favorably about him in his testimony, or he’ll lose his last chance at having a relationship with his son. As they trek into the forest together, Arlo’s attempts at bonding are undercut when his deep seated anger bubbles to the surface, a result of his own traumatic childhood. Rhett is driven further away from Arlo and into a world of escapist fantasy as he begins to see a strange,creature following them on their journey--a unicorn. Their relationship reaches a breaking point when Arlo tries to replicate a bonding moment from his own childhood by tricking Rhett into shooting a deer. Rhett feels betrayed, leading to a fight that forces both of them to confront the unicorn. Arlo refuses to believe it is real, seeing instead a horse with a tumor. He tries to kill it to put it out of its misery, but Rhett stops him by shooting him with a flare gun and fleeing with the unicorn, resulting in a fire that engulfs the forest and attracts the attention of forest rangers. While Rhett escapes with his new companion, Arlo desperately tries to track Rhett down before he is arrested for starting the fire. Lost and afraid, Rhett must utilize survival techniques he learned from Arlo to survive, while Arlo realizes he must opens up his sense of wonder and imagination if he is to have any hope of finding Rhett. After reuniting, both characters will have come to adopt the views of the other--Rhett realizes that the fantasy world he wishes for is not compatible with the reality he finds himself in and Arlo understands he must accept his son and the unicorn in order to save their relationship, resulting in both of them sacrificing everything to save themselves and each other.