"L’Enfant" (2006)

In L’Enfant, Bruno (Jeremie Renier) has no allegiances to anyone but himself. He would, and does, sell his own child if it served his own ends. Bruno has the looks and the charm to have been a big shot in high school but has amounted to little since. Barely scraping by off petty thievery, Bruno is looking to do anything to make some cash and has few scruples as to how that cash is attained. His girlfriend Sonia (Deobrah Francois), who recently gave birth to his son, is a study in contrast: shy, kind and meek. She must have been swept up by Bruno’s brash rebellious charisma when she was too young (and she is still very young) to realize the reckless amoral pit underneath. The film’s centerpiece involves Bruno selling his own son Jimmy to thugs who claim they’re going to find people to adopt him. What little measure of conscience Bruno has shows itself when it dawns on him what giving up the child means for the little bit of stability and contentment in his life. Sonia reacts as well as we might expect, passing out from shock and disowning Bruno upon the delivery of the news. Bruno, panicked both because he doesn’t want to lose Sonia and because she draws the attention of the police, attempts to retrieve his son back. The film’s title, which translates to “the child”, doubles for Bruno’s son as well as Bruno’s apparent arrested development. Directors Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne tell the story with a sense of kitchen sink realism; the film is interested in the struggles and tiny details of working class life. While Bruno’s eventual actions are troubling and dark, the film doesn’t entirely lapse into somberness. The film, in its final stretch, is painfully thrilling as Bruno’s criminal activities finally catch up to him. Early on the film observes Bruno and Sonia’s relationship and it is warm and tender. These are two people who are in love, or, at least, think they, and that makes Bruno’s actions all the more despairing. 

Grade: A