Capernaum

"Capernaum" is a very unpleasant film that deals with very unpleasant situations and people. Because of that, it's not a film for kids to watch and I don't recommend anyone suffering from depression watch the movie....it's very hard to take and is brutal in its realism.

The film is about a 12 year-old named Zain who lives in Lebanon and who physically looks like a 9 or 10 year-old...possibly because of malnutrition. The film begins with the boy in prison for stabbing someone and his parents have been called back to court because the boy is now suing them for bringing him life. The film then is a series of flashbacks which show how neglected the boy was. It became so bad that eventually he is taken in by an illegal alien and he takes care of her baby while she goes out looking for any work. Later, when she disappears, Zain continues caring for the baby and trying to work at the same time. It's a miserable existence and you know eventually it will end in violence.

This film was made with a minimum of dialog and a plot that is hard to see without the story tearing at your heart. It's one of the more unpleasant movies I've seen in some time and implies many things that aren't overtly stated, such as pedophilia and other ghastly crimes. Hard to take...so much so that although it's an excellent character study, it's the sort of film few would really want to watch in the first place.