However, Hugh Jackman is not one of those issues. I have problems with his character, but his performance is devastatingly honest. His character, Peter Miller, comes from a troubled childhood with severe daddy issues. He lived with a chronically ill mother that he was forced to care for to her dying day, all the while his father (Anthony Hopkins) furthered his political ambitions in Washington. Peter has never forgiven his father for the fallout, having vowed since then to be a better father than he ever was. The problem is, life took some unexpected turns. Despite a seemingly ideal marriage with Kate (Laura Dern), with their son Nicholas (Zen McGrath), that family eventually fractured. Now in a relationship with Beth (Vanessa Kirby), and with a newborn son Theo, Peter finds himself struggling in managing his work/life balance.
By all appearances, Peter is a good man and a dedicated father, but he's also a severe workaholic, barely home and at the office otherwise, and struggling to juggle the responsibility tossed his way. It's the classic story of the man who became what he hated. Even if his intentions are different, and he tries to be more actively involved with his family life, you can still feel those inklings of control and pride seep in, especially as his own ambitions drive a wedge between him and the ones he loves. Pride proves to be his greatest Achilles heel, midway through the film visiting his father for lunch, essentially there to humblebrag about what a good dad he's been, before Hopkins claps back at his ego, scathingly telling him to "get over it." A notion he unintentionally seems to be putting upon others, emulating his father by trudging out the unfortunate circumstances he grew up under, as if minimizing the pain of others.
And Jackman is terrific in how he handles those tonal shifts, and the conflicted emotions he experiences between scenes, at times practically carrying the movie. He's not the only one to be certain, as Laura Dern is wonderful as his ex-wife Kate, herself a sorrowful portrait of a mother at her breaking point, trying her hardest to understand a complex situation, and grappling with the weight of her options. Vanessa Kirby, quietly superb as Peter's new partner Beth, adds some rich depth and sensitivity with genuine chemistry with Jackman, while Anthony Hopkins' big scene halfway through the film is a major highlight.
However, this is where my issues with the film begin, and before I run them down, I should warn you that I will be addressing themes of depression and self-harm, so if any of that upsets or triggers you, I just want to alert you upfront. With that said, let's begin...
By far the worst issue with The Son is Nicholas, and Zen McGrath's performance. This movie is about teenage depression, specifically major depressive disorder, which Nicholas seems to be suffering from. Nicholas is an apathetic person to say the least. He repeatedly skips school and lies to his parents about it, he has no social life and has no desire to have one, he's incredibly dismissive and aimless, and rarely does he ever seem to take joy in life. In addition, he's prone to repeated instances of cutting his arms to channel his pain, wracked from angst that even he can't pinpoint.
Ok. I know this movie probably had its heart in the right place. It knows the gravity of this topic, that these are very murky waters, and even includes a list of resources and emergency hotlines during the end credits. So I know Zeller wants to approach this with the best intentions... HOWEVER! That does not excuse the fact that this movie SEVERELY mishandles those talking points.
For this movie to work depends on the strength of Nicholas as a character, which in many instances, he isn't. He's a plot device, a sounding board for other characters, and a MacGuffin to move the story forward. Ideally, HE should be the main character, and he should be the perspective the audience most closely follows. If anything, the movie is less interested in how he grapples with his depression, and more interested in how it affects everyone around him. Key in this is where his depression even stems from. He's left in perpetual apathy, with Nicholas himself describing it as "I'm tired of living, and I feel like I don't belong anywhere." The film seems to be implying that it started when Peter abandoned his family, but with the acute degree that his depression has progressed, that suggests much deeper roots than is being acknowledged.
While you could read this as the film trying to remain ambiguous, I just took it as the film having no interest in plunging deeper into Nicholas' mental state, because that wasn't where their interests were. The interest was in having one more way to crowbar problematic parentage into the movie, with both Peter and Kate feeling ill-equipped on how to even address his behavior, and how to treat him for it; Peter in particular. I know this is part of the character's arc, in that Peter wants to be there for his son, but feels oddly detached and disinterested at the same time, but this actually serves to weaken their relationship. Characters in this movie so rarely feel willing to TALK to each other without reverting to melodrama.
There are instances where the film gets the balance right, such as a scene where Peter and Beth try to teach Nicholas to dance, set to Tom Jones' "It's Not Unusual," where Nicholas' smile almost instantly fades away amidst the fun. That is the direction this film should have gone more often, but it's not only inconsistent in how it tackles his depressive state, it only falls back onto it for cheap emotional wallops. The film may not be explicit, as its only intense image is fresh scars with mild blood on Nicholas' arms, but it certainly doesn't approach it with any sensitivity, bolting right out with its descriptions and potential triggers, to the point that it exploits them. Every one of these triggers feel calculated and cherry-picked for maximum shock value.
That's the real issue here. The Son uses the topic for melodrama, not just trying to tug the heartstrings, but to utterly rip them out. Everything that Zeller's previous film didn't do, and I could just feel him prodding me for an emotional response. Hans Zimmer's score is especially pandering, in that it's signposting when you're supposed to cry. But at this point, you don't care, not only because the core themes of the movie have failed to engage you, but you can pinpoint when key plot developments are going to occur. Without spoiling anything, Peter and Nicholas have a conversation where a significant detail is established, and so for the rest of the movie, you're sitting there waiting for that set up to come back around, and it is tasteless when it does.
And the ending only adds to the infuriating handling of those themes. Again, without spoiling anything, this is where the film feels most in line with Zeller's previous The Father, in which The Son tries to end on a note of profundity. Unfortunately, it backfires on the film, in that it instead feels like a cheap last attempt at wringing tears, as well as exacerbating earlier issues, and making them more pronounced. This is what drove me over the edge, and made me gradually lose patience with this movie, because it didn't treat this with the respect it needed. It used it as a tool.
The Son may not be a terrible film in any technical sense. It's well-performed, it isn't incompetent, it isn't even badly structured. The problem is that it tried to tackle a delicate topic, and mangled it to fit into a horrendous template. Which is a shame, because The Father proved Zeller could tackle a serious affliction with sensitivity, and could be heartbreaking because of it. But that same lightning in a bottle just isn't recaptured, and the final film frustrates me more than it brings me to tears. It broke my heart, but not in the way he intended.
** / *****
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