|
The Son review
:. Director: Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne
:. Starring: Olivier Gourmet, Morgan Marinne
:. Running Time: 1:43
:. Year: 2002
:. Country: France
|
With The Son, the Dardenne brothers are back with their mascot, actor Olivier Gourmet, in a film where a man finds himself face to face with the murderer of his son.
Olivier works at a carpenter's workshop. When Francis, a young 16 year-old boy, arrives as an apprentice Olivier believes he sees a ghost. Francis is none other than his son's strangler five years earlier. Seized with a mix of attraction and fear, Olivier will try to understand.
Dardenne's camera follows this man who acts without really knowing where he is going. What will he decide concerning the fate of this assassin who paid his debt to society? Throughout the film, shots tightened and restricted to film Olivier's body, try to light his boiling thoughts, questions and interior fights. The film stays on the surfaces of the body to better penetrate the thoughts.
In vain, Olivier is unable to know the motivations of his acts. The more the film advances, the more the relationship between the two psychologically bruised human beings is strengthened. As they slowly learn how to get to know each other, the more the camera opens up to field and space. The camera moves away to let them breathe. A film about forgiveness (the final magnificent shot shows the mentor and his apprentice wrapping some boards of pine), The Son could just as easily have been called "The Father". In a transmission of knowledge, the father will throw himself into the education of a new symbolic son, the very one who, without replacing him, interrupted the education of his biological son.
Without Manicheanism, the Son is a touching film about two destroyed human beings that learn how to live with the weight of the past, decency and respect.
Moland Fengkovm
 French Films: 2012+ & current Reviews
French Films: 1998 - 2011 Reviews
French Music Reviews
|
|
