"Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close" is a handsomely polished, thoughtfully wrapped Hollywood production about the national tragedy of 9/11 that seems to have forever redefined words like "unthinkable," "unforgivable," "catastrophic."

It has also redefined our expectations of filmmakers who try to examine the still-aching wound – and perhaps explains why most films about 9/11 haven't resonated with audiences. Mindful of that, director Stephen Daldry has taken great care in looking at it through the eyes of a precocious New York City boy in a film filled with sentiment and substance.

Finding the right balance was critical to making any adaptation of Jonathan Safran Foer's provocative novel work. But this is a filmmaker who's equally sensitive and bold in handling films with heavy emotional and political content as he has in "Billy Elliot," "The Hours" and "The Reader."

He's up to the task again with "Extremely Loud." Screenwriter Eric Roth ("Munich") has brought things back to Ground Zero through the story of one family torn asunder by the World Trade Center attacks. So it seems a smart choice to put two quintessentially heartland stars in Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock at its center. It makes acceptance easier, offense harder.

They portray Thomas and Linda Schell, the lost father and grieving mother of Oskar, a mildly autistic 11-year-old played by the talented Thomas Horn. Oskar is a naturally anxious boy – fearful in ways his father had tried to help mitigate with intricate explorations of the city.

Though there are many themes coursing through this movie, its primary concern is how anyone copes with a loss like this one. The filmmakers dive into the deep end as soon as we've gotten to know the boy who becomes the totem for our collective pain. In Oskar's case it's the loss not only of his father but his best friend. In Hanks' hands, Thomas is kind, funny, clever and fascinated by his son. He also becomes the film's primary source of comfort.

Reteaming with Oscar-winning cinematographer Chris Menges, the director has kept much of the film awash in sunlight despite its subject and filled with details that make it feel specific to New York and yet universally familiar.

While home is a claustrophobic apartment, captured with tight shots of tight corners, the film opens up and the camera pulls back as Oskar's world begins expanding after he discovers a key hidden in his father's closet. Convinced that it will reveal something important if only he can find the lock, he sets out to cover the five boroughs in search of the person whose name is on the envelope that held the key. That search becomes the engine that drives the rest of the film.

This also becomes the movie's treatise on healing as it takes Oskar into the homes of the traumatized nation of ordinary people, some coping, others not.

Through the boy, Daldry brings it all down to a human level. "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close" won't be the last cinematic word on 9/11, but it proves to be an eloquent one.

EXTREMELY LOUD & INCREDIBLY CLOSE

3 stars

Cast: Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Thomas Horn, Zoe Caldwell, Viola Davis, Jeffrey Wright, Max von Sydow

Director: Stephen Daldry

115 minutes

Rated: PG-13

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