While it has a heavy musical theme, actor Freddie Highmore doesn't think that "August Rush" is a movie that will only appeal to diehard music lovers.

"In my life and in everyone's life, music is there and calling out for them," Highmore said in a recent @ The Movies interview. "Everyone relates to music."

And with Highmore in the title role of the stirring musical drama, it's pretty much a guarantee that, like his past performances, audiences will relate to him.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that Highmore is perfectly in tune with moviegoers, gauging his stunning turns opposite Johnny Depp as the inspiration for Peter Pan in "Finding Neverland" and again as the title star of Depp's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory."

Now in "August Rush," Highmore undoubtedly delivers his most noteworthy performance yet, so to speak, as a musical prodigy of Mozart-like proportions.

The refreshing thing is, it appears that playing the title character in "August Rush" is like another day of work for Highmore. That's because it takes no more than a minute in a conversation with him to realize that he's a levelheaded 15-year-old who's making the right career moves in a business that can pigeonhole a young actor in a flicker of a film frame.

In fact, the British actor downplays the success he's had so far in the movie business, and just hopes the opportunities keep coming -- even though you have to believe that he's in high demand.

"It's not like I go home every day and there are 10 scripts to read or anything," said Highmore. "It's nice to try something different in every film that you do. In 'August Rush' I did an American accent for the first time, plus there's the whole musical side of things is something I've never explored in film."

In the film, Highmore plays the older version of Evan, birth child of Louis Connelly (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), a charismatic Irish rock guitarist and Lyla Novacek (Keri Russell), a sheltered cellist, conceived after a chance encounter in New York City. The harmonic connection Louis and Lyla had with each other resulted in instant love, but Lyla's overprotective father (William Sadler) intervened in the relationship right away and months later, after a tragic accident, made Lyla believe that the child she and Louis had conceived had died.

Nearly 12 years later, Evan, who swears the music he hears in his head is the key to connecting him with his parents, takes off from the boys' home he's lived all of his life and ventures to New York City to find them. But instead, he encounters a temperamental street musician known as Wizard (Robin Williams), and a guitar for the very first time. Renaming Evan "August Rush," Wizard sets out exploit the boy's musical gift for money -- but August is convinced that his talents is what will draw him, Lyla and Louis together, if they only listen to the music.

Also starring Terrence Howard, "August Rush" opens in theaters Wednesday.

While the story of "August Rush" may sound like a fairy tale, the idea of a young prodigy is definitely grounded in reality, Highmore said. One source of inspiration was child musical prodigy Jay Greenberg, who wrote five symphonies as a 12-year-old student at the Juilliard School in New York.

"I don't think the idea's so fantastical at all -- I think it could happen," Highmore said. "Jay Greenberg was a musical genius like August. He could write symphonies in 20 minutes, and play on the piano and compose brilliantly."

A clarinet player, Highmore wasn't exactly a stranger to music when he signed on to do "August Rush." Needless to say, the demands on the actor were immense for him to convince audiences that he was really a virtuoso.

But instead of relying on movie magic, Highmore boldly learned in six months the innovative, rhythmic hand-slapping guitar playing style made famous by late new age musician Michael Hedges. Highmore feels that the unorthodox approach to playing the guitar is appropriate for the film, because from the first time August touches the guitar, we realizes that he isn't your average, ordinary musician.

"I think it's more realistic that way -- you've got a musical genius who sees a guitar for the first time, but he's not going to immediately know how to play a G chord or whatever," Highmore said. "So it seems natural that he could just slap the frets and come up with his own style of playing. It was Michael Hedges whom August's playing was modeled after because he did that similar thing of slapping the guitar while he was playing it."

Highmore said that he'd keep playing, although his repertoire will be limited.

"It's nice to pick up the guitar now and again and play back the songs and be reminded of the film -- but if you gave me any other songs to play, I wouldn't be very good at them," Highmore said with a laugh.

Of course, Highmore will always be able to fall back on acting -- a career that he feels lucky to cultivate with the likes of Williams and Depp.

"I've never gone to an acting school, so you do pick up some things from actors on the set," Highmore said. "I think from Johnny Depp it's about learning how to underplay an emotion, so you don't have to go out there and cry loudly for people to understand you're upset. It can be more internal, like August."

As for Williams in "August Rush," Highmore called his role "brilliant casting."

"He's got so much energy normally, that when you put him into a character like Wizard --who hasn't played for a while who's so wound up, he can't burst out and be who he was -- it's brilliant," Highmore observed. "When Wizard looks at August, it's like he's looking in a mirror and saying, 'This is what you could have been,' but he made a choice not to be."