First-time feature writer-directors Tyler Nilson and Mike Schwartz met their leading man, Zack Gottsagen, at a camp for disabled actors and decided to put him at the center of a movie.

A performer and teacher as well as an advocate* for people with disabilities, Gottsagen appeared in the 2014 documentary “Becoming Bulletproof” and steps into his first narrative film as Zak, a 22-year-old with Down syndrome who runs away from a nursing home. In this story of three strangers forming a substitute family, Zak is without one of his own. The state has placed him in a facility where he clearly doesn’t belong, though he makes friends with a roommate (Bruce Dern), who helps him break out, and Eleanor (Dakota Johnson), the calm volunteer who’s given the task to find him before the authorities discover that he’s missing.

Zak soon finds a traveling companion, guide and protector in Tyler (Shia LaBeouf), a small-time outlaw* on the run. Despite his reluctance* at the beginning, Tyler is clearly charmed by Zak’s childlike innocence* and gutsiness*.

At loose ends since the death of his brother (Jon Bernthal, seen in flashbacks), Tyler needs this chance for brotherly expression. He needs to teach Zak to swim and to shoot. His pep talks with the younger man, telling him to embrace his inner hero, might be preachy, but Tyler is talking to himself too, and searching for self-forgiveness.

For his part, Zak is following a dream: He wants to become a wrestler like his idol, Salt Water Redneck (Thomas Haden Church). Hoping to start a new life in Florida, Tyler promises to drop Zak off at the video star’s North Carolina wrestling school. Even with Duncan (John Hawkes) and his sidekick Ratboy (rapper Yelawolf) on their trail*, there’s little suspense or heat in their journey through the Carolinas.

A seemingly abandoned house turns out to be the home of a blind preacher (Wayne DeHart), who baptizes Zak and Tyler and gives them what they need for their raft.

The journey is like a storybook idyll*, especially after Eleanor finds that she can’t persuade Zak to go with her and joins them on the raft they’ve built.

Their journey takes them through a pure, natural world until they meet Salt Water Redneck. Faced with Zak’s adulation*, Salt Water Redneck moves from wariness to eager engagement.

The film pays homage to “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.”

(SD-Agencies)