Grade: C
The Son is a movie that feels like a rough draft that might be shown to a first round of test audiences. I really wanted to like it. This is a great team, and it contains some excellent actors and acting. But it needed to cook some more. The script frequently doesn’t let characters finish sentences; there’s one scene where I think the dialogue is all interruptions. Mental health/illness is a major theme here, but it’s treated as a shallow plot point – a MacGuffin to move things along – and not explored in any substantive way. The Son is dark, sad, uptight, deadly solemn, and creaks along at a snail’s pace. It’s a soap opera with less music.
Director Florian Zeller also did The Father. Given the related motif of the titles, and that they share a director and actor, I wondered if Zeller was starting a Familial Cinematic Universe of sorts. But no, The Father and The Son are stand-alones that have nothing to do with each other. The one carryover from The Father’s cast is Anthony Hopkins. At his age, he could so easily settle into just playing his usual persona on screen, but thankfully doesn’t. He is still digging, examining, and creating fresh characters. His one scene in The Son is a highlight. After misinterpreting and overreacting to something his son tells him, he turns cold, blunt, and slimy. It’s so great to see him ACT.
The film’s title could refer to Hopkins’s son (Hugh Jackman), or Jackman’s troubled 17-year-old son from his first wife (Laura Dern). Jackman lives with the woman he left Dern for (Vanessa Kirby). They have a new baby boy together. The movie spends so much time on the relationship between Jackman and his teenager that the infant seems like an afterthought. He is precious and melted my heart whenever I saw him, to the point of being distracting when in the shot during crucial scenes. Also distracting (and providing the biggest unintended laugh) is a big dog sitting next to a therapist in the office for absolutely no reason. It reminded me of the dog by the cash register in the flower shop in The Room.
Broadway veteran Hugh Jackman demonstrates that he can carry a movie, even a heavy one like this, without his usual musical theatre crutch. Laura Dern is such a treasure, and as you would expect, is just right. Zen McGrath as the teenager isn’t believable when he’s brooding and on the verge of tears, but does well in his few and far between bits of happiness. Vanessa Kirby now joins my list of favorite actresses working today – along with Olivia Colman, Saoirse Ronan, and Florence Pugh. She was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar two years ago for Pieces of a Woman. That movie is also a downer, filled to the brim with things to unpack, but is far superior to The Son. After these films, I hope she’ll get to do something light, like a bouncy rom-com.
There is a VERY abrupt moment near the end, which leads to two shameless cheap fake-outs, and a final scene that will put you in the doldrums and make you want to watch a Family Guy or something. The Son is the most maudlin movie I will see this year, or at least I hope so. I was glad to be done with it.
Grade: C
Film Reviews by Mark 
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