Fans of the author J.D. Salinger and his singular novel, “The Catcher in the Rye,” will likely know most of the details divulged in writer-director Danny Strong’s biographical drama “Rebel in the Rye” — and anyone, fan or not, will likely find Strong’s recounting quite dull.
After an opening that shows Salinger (Nicholas Hoult) in a mental institution, shell-shocked from what he saw as a soldier in World War II, Strong introduces the author as an ambitious, slightly arrogant young college student in 1939. Defying his businessman father (Victor Garber) and pleasing his mother (Hope Davis), he declares he intends to become a writer and enrolls at Columbia University.