The Quiet Son Jouer avec le feu

Synopsis

Pierre (Vincent Lindon, La Haine, Titane), a devoted father in his fifties, is raising his two sons alone in a “rust belt” city in northern France. While the brothers couldn’t be more different — athletic Fus spends his time on football and cage fighting, while Louis’s nose is buried in his books — the three form a tight-knit family. But as Louis immerses himself in his studies, Fus’s behavior becomes increasingly furtive and distant. When it becomes clear that Fus has been seduced by a local far-right group, an explosive rift develops between him and his union-leader father.

A sense of intimacy and urgency propels this timely family drama from writer-director sister duo Delphine and Muriel Coulin, as The Quiet Son grapples with questions of how to accept and find common ground with loved ones we no longer recognize. What can be forgiven, and what line is too far to cross? The always masterful Lindon stands out as a conflicted father who’s torn between love and hate and hope and despair.