The Son

When I began this movie, I really had no idea where the story was going to go. I just saw that it was a Hugh Jackman film and wanted to see it. He's always been one of my favorite actors. This story is very personal to me because not only have I too dealt with mental illness for a long time now, but I have also lost several loved ones to suicide. My heart felt like it was being ripped from my chest. Watching this story also made me question how I have dealt with my own children at times. Now, they are all adults but one of my sons deals with depression and anxiety and there were some years during his adolescence that I really worried if he would try to hurt himself. I encourage everyone who watches this film, to hugged your children tight, constantly tell them you love them, and pay attention to them. It is so easy to get involved in life and miss little clues that are right there. But truthfully, just as it is performed in this movie, our love can prevent us from seeing the truth because we don't want to believe it. This was a very touching movie.

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.

Just a bit of research into the works of writer, playwright, director Florian Zeller gave me the information that the he has made a trilogy namely " The mother" ( stage play) a decade back and two movies " The father " and " The son" recently. While I have not seen the play, I found "The father" an excellent movie embellished with the outstanding performance of Sir Anthony Hopkins for which he got the much deserved Oscar award. This movie too is first rate ( but not without its flaws) and has some good acting of Hugh Jackman and Laura Dern with a bonus of a cameo of Anthony Hopkins as the grandfather. Some critics and reviewers have said unkind words about this movie since they found it too bleak and schmaltzy and have also criticized the acting. Not fair really because the subject demanded sentimentality, poignancy and pensiveness. The main characters are the father ( Hugh), the ex wife ( Laura Dern), their 17 year old son ( Zen McGrath) and the present wife ( Venessa Kirby). The son is traumatized by his parent's divorce, he is in acute depression and moves in to live with the father but he is not able to stabilise causing misery to all. He blames his father for divorcing his mom.

Director Florian builds up a charged atmosphere with some heart wrenching scenes as the parents try to get the son to normalise and fit in the family. Those familiar with or knowledgeable on mental health issues may find fault with some points of the narrative specially the apparent inaction by the parents on a few obvious red flags. While most scenes are moving, some may find them cringe worthy and off putting. Actingwise Hugh has put up a good performance showing a father's remorse and guilt. Laura is good as usual and on familiar turf as the distraught mother, a role she has done earlier. Teenager Zen has done well considering his age and experience. I thought he projected the pain, confusion, distress and bitterness very well. There is a beautifully crafted and enacted scene between Hugh and Anthony Hopkins as father and son. The background music enhances the dramatic effect.

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.

I actually really liked this movie. I believe it tells a good story about family as their son struggles with a mental illness. The biggest problem with this movie is that some of its line deliveries come off as weird and unnatural. Also there is a scene that is mentioned but we do not actually see it. This movie is not an easy watch. The movie gets to be very heavy at certain moments. Even with all of those problems the movie is carried by a great performance by Huge Jackman and Lora Dern. This movie gives great insight into what it is like to be battle with a mental illness. Some people may not like this as much as me, but this is a really good movie.