This rare B&W feature is notable for its head-on dealing with child abuse issues, but what is particularly disturbing about it is something else, and I'm not really sure how the director intended it to be taken. Of course we sympathize with the abused kid Thomas and are horrified at his treatment by his parents. But it's hard to know what was intended in portraying Larry, the gay filmmaker who gets involved with him as a subject for his documentary about child abuse, as glib and blase about using him that way. He seems unconcerned about the ethical issues of not reporting Thomas' situation (of which he soon has evidence) to the authorities.
And then after a point the two become sexually involved, which needless to say brings up issues of pederastic sexual exploitation (as Thomas is supposed to be 14, though the actor playing him was probably 18 or 19 during filming, and looks it). Apart from the doctor character played by Steve James, there's not much onscreen or even implied criticism of this relationship or its appropriateness, and there are stock "romantic couple having fun" montages that are the opposite of critical. Towards the end Larry does become more urgently concerned about Thomas, but as when they met the boy was already being severely mistreated, this arrives rather too late to wash away the weirdness of his casual attitude in dealing with the youth as an abuse victim, not to mention also as a viable romantic partner. And no, it's not an "Oh well, people were so much more open-minded back then" thing. I was a young adult in 1983. Trust me, no one in the gay community would have thought it was OK to behave as Larry does. Yes, NAMBLA existed, but it was (and apparently remains) a tiny extremist fringe group whom nobody wanted to be associated with.
Like Bressan's other non-adult feature "Buddies," "Abuse" is crude in some aspects. It's obviously made on a shoestring, has uneven acting, and is more sophisticated in its politics (at least as far as the perspective on child abuse goes) than in its dramaturgy. Is Larry meant to be quite so unsympathetic? Or did Bressan simply see him as a fellow artist, necessarily prioritizing his art above anything (and anyone) else? it's hard to know. I'm sure the film was intended to provoke and disturb, but its ambiguities are clumsily laid out, which is a real problem when dealing with issues this incendiary. So, an interesting and significant film, but a very mixed bag in artistic terms.
