Film Review: "The Son"

 

Director Florian Zeller impressed viewers with his gripping 2020 drama, The Father. The film starred Anthony Hopkins as an elderly man dealing with dementia. Simultaneously, the story dealt with the effects of dementia on his family. How the story dealt with the struggle of dementia was honest and relatable for modern audiences. Having dealt with dementia in my own family, it struck a heavy emotional chord with me.  My love for that film increased my excitement for Zeller’s follow-up, The Son.

The Son follows Peter (Hugh Jackman) living a busy life with his new wife Beth (Vanessa Kirby) and a young child. When Peter’s ex-wife Kate (Laura Dern) shows up at the door with their teenage son Nicholas (Zen McGrath), serious health obstacles await. In theory, The Son could have been another hit for Zeller, but that is not the case.  The film unfortunately falls short of those goals, trading genuine emotion for melodrama. My issues with The Son reside in the screenplay written by Zeller.

The film is adapted from a stage play written by Florian Zeller himself.  Full disclosure, the film deals with the topic of mental illness among teenagers.  The Son treats this material as exploitative self-pity. The self-pity would work as a narrative device if viewers did not see the story through Peter’s eyes. Telling the story through Peter’s eyes makes every character seem like an idea. None of these people have an ounce of realism and are simply blank canvases that emit emotions. Every decision being made is to squeeze any ounce of drama from the plot, making serious moments fall flat. 

Certain scenes in The Son made me the angriest I have been about any film in 2022. Zeller’s screenplay wants to be truthful about the emotional toll this illness takes.  The actors are giving it their all, but the emotional moments are just silly. Having dealt with mental illness in my personal life, there are completely false situations. Characters make decisions that are examples of pure idiocracy.  That idiocracy is delivered through performances of actors who overly emote. These idiotic moments involve Jackman trying to deal with and accept his son's illness.

Jackman most definitely keeps viewers' attention by making incredibly poor decisions regarding his son. These decisions negate the film's only moments of genuine substance, with Laura Dern and Vanessa Kirby. When the film quiets down, there are glimmers of realistic, and humane hearts and relatable characters. Once Jackman gets into the more heavy emotional scenes are where my issues arise. The biggest issue is that none of these characters feel related to one another, especially Zen McGrath. 

Having seen the film in November, I have not forgotten the anger I felt while watching it.  Every character is given a moment to yell and or berate Nicholas for some action. In response, McGrath’s performance is subdued, with his solo character trait being a quivering lip. The two-hour running time attempts to engage us with real emotional scenarios.  That real emotion is undercut with a preposterous and disastrous third-act twist. To avoid spoilers, this twist can only be described in one way.  Imagine an Oscar-hopeful drama, with all-star talent in front of and behind the camera,  with a CW-level third-act twist.

No film last year has left me with such an angry reaction as Florian Zeller’s The Son. The film is baffling in its entirely false take on a serious subject. Particular dialogue-heavy sequences have no emotional impact. These sequences, like one out-of-place scene with Anthony Hopkins, are meant to tell viewers about the characters.  The problem is that they don’t tell audiences anything of importance.  The Son is much more than a “disappointing” film that 2022 had to offer audiences. The film is a lazy, inappropriate misstep on a serious issue plaguing Americans on a daily basis. The Son is the worst film I saw in the year 2022.