Child actors

I have just seen a marvellous film, "Mean Creek", and its cast is mainly child actors. What is so impressive is that they are all so good. What is even more amazing to me is that the Culkin boy, younger brother of the famous one from "Home Alone", is such a superb actor. In any group of actors there is usually a sort of leader who holds the story together: in this case it's Rory Culkin.
But the others, all of them, are excellent. It must take a special talent to induce from the lads and one girl such sincere-seeming performances. The director of this film, his first film, evidently has a special talent.
I think of Carol Reed and "The Fallen Idol"; he too had a special talent working with children. In that film I believe I heard that to get a good performance from a boy so young he told him stories that were quite different from the one the boy was acting in.