The Dardenne brothers craft cinematic parables that evoke an ethical imagination within the viewer through subverting expectations. At first glance, The Son may feel like a typical revenge thriller as a carpenter (Olivier Gourmet) takes a young man as an apprentice with the knowledge that this troubled boy is the murderer of his son. But while images of saws and tools intimate violence and a tense third-act journey to an isolated lumberyard seems to set up an act of revenge, the Dardennes continually resist convention for the sake of mystery and mercy. The film opens in media res, the camera frantically following Olivier as we wonder where this man is headed. Olivier’s enigmatic decisions keep the audience guessing, the tension building as the carpenter and the young man grow closer, and the final scenes offer a catharsis that feels at-once earned and inexplicable. At one point, Olivier’s estranged wife tearfully asks him why he would take the killer of their son under his wing. “I don’t know,” is all he can say. We don’t know either. Sometimes—perhaps every time—acts of mercy confound our human expectations and tendencies, but we are always moved when we see them.
—Joel Mayward