By Shannon Sturgis Vincent Insalaco III and Tim Ballany, the inspiration for the film War Eagle, Arkansas, have been friends since childhood. The film will have its theatrical release in Arkansas on June 12.

LITTLE ROCK — Small town Arkansas will soon be making its way to the big screen as the award-winning film festival circuit veteran War Eagle, Arkansas opens in theaters next weekend, including locally at The Rave movie theater in Little Rock.

Set and filmed in the picturesque Ozark Mountains, the film is an emotional, character-driven drama about the enduring friendship of two young men whose lives are taking them in different directions.

Enoch Cass, a standout high school baseball pitcher who suffers from a severe stutter, has talent enough to earn him a college scholarship offer and a chance to escape his rural roots, something his domineering grandfather very much wants him to do.

But taking that offer would mean leaving behind everything he holds dear, including his best and only friend since childhood, Samuel "Wheels" Macon, so nicknamed because he has long been confined to a wheelchair by cerebral palsy. Literally completing each other, the bond between the two is so tight they function like two halves of a single person.

But the fact the film is based on a true story makes it all the more poignant.

"It's hard to put into words," said Vincent Insalaco III - the real life Enoch Cass - of seeing the film opening up to the world. "Sometimes it seems real, sometimes it doesn't."

Like any friends, Insalaco and Tim Ballany (the inspiration for Wheels) had their ups and downs. Those were first recorded as a story by Insalaco's father and later related to Conway native Graham Gordy, who wrote the screenplay. Now grown men living in North Little Rock and still friends today, the two said seeing the film come to life has been a humbling experience.

"It was interesting to see all my imperfections," said Ballany, who said the performance of Dan McCabe, who plays Wheels, is so exact that Ballany's mother "literally almost fell out of her chair" when she saw it.

"When I see the film ... and see the way the Enoch character [played by Luke Grimes] stutters, I'm reminded of the way it used to be," said Insalaco. "To see that - it's odd."

But not painful, he said.

"It's the simple fact that if I hadn't gone through that, I wouldn't appreciate things. I wouldn't be the person I am," he said.

Though the story is authentic, certain elements have been changed. The setting was moved to rural Arkansas, to make the state itself be one of the stars of the film. But the town of War Eagle was not chosen at random. Living on opposite sides of the neighborhood as kids, Insalaco and Ballany would meet up on War Eagle Drive every day, so the town served as a poetic choice.

And that's a reflection of the poetic nature of the film, which is a touching ode to what a wonderful and heartbreaking experience growing up can be - and how important the people you meet along the way really are.