Not all movies are meant to entertain. Some movies are meant to inform or to educate. Some movies are meant to explain how life really is for some people. This movie stands at the pinnacle for trying to help others comprehend mental heath issues that very few people understand. If you haven't lived that life, please shut up and save your artistic criticisms for another movie. I don't care what you think. This movie tried to look at the mental health issue from all sides - parent, child, and other loved ones. It was gut wrenching. It was an extraordinarily realistic depiction of what goes on in a family torn apart by mental health battles. Life becomes a war zone. And during the battle or after the war you begin to reflect and it tears you apart. You ask yourself what just happened. You ask yourself how it happened. And guess what - you have no answers to your questions. Bravo Mr. Zeller.
Plot summary
A successful lawyer, with a new wife and infant, agrees to care for his teenage son from a previous marriage after his ex-wife becomes concerned about the boy's wayward behavior.
Uploaded by: FREEMAN
March 26, 2023 at 12:50 PM
Director
Top cast
Tech specs
720p.BLU 1080p.BLU 720p.WEB 1080p.WEBMovie Reviews
Extraordinary!
Disturbing and profound
The Son is every parent's nightmare. Reminiscent of Birth in the way the uncanny permeates every frame and implants a creeping sense of foreboding under your skin. Vanessa Kirby as Beth is the most relatable character, as she seems as confused by Nicholas as the audience. Hugh Jackman nails it as the father trying to do the right thing and slowly realising that there are some things that are just beyond our control. Zen McGrath is naturalistic as Nicholas, allowing the actions to speak for themselves and calibrating perfectly a performance it would be easy to over-egg. There is something stagey about the production, a nod to the play origins, and done deliberately one feels, as it adds to the sense of unreal events overtaking characters. My favourite moment was when the parents leave the hospital having made one decision, only for the next cut to show they reversed it. A harrowing film that will hopefully start important conversations for some people.
Despair
Whether or not this is about behavior, due to some degree of mental illness, both parents and step-mother, especially the father, seem completely out of touch with their son's very real and obvious psychiatric and emotional problems to the degree of appearing themselves part of the problem, if not even the trigger of the escalation.
But I am not sure what the movie was telling us? Somewhere between script, direction and editing the whole thing got either diluted to indecisiveness of message, or confusion about the moral we were supposed to walk away with.
Even the actors seemed confused as to how they were supposed to deliver their parts.
It could be argued that real life is like that, but I've had 64 years of it and I would disagree.
The kid had real psychiatric issues and he was even explaining them to his parents, who were competitive go-getters by nature and they seemed to be in total denial of their son's reality.
I think the movie was a good idea badly executed.