One reason these images become etched in your mind is that the film puts you in the shoes of the perpetrator and, to a lesser degree, of his captive. They are acutely aware of the other’s proximity and of the possibilities for escape.
Much of the time their relationship resembles a father-son bond. They do jigsaw puzzles, watch television, decorate a small Christmas tree, share meals, then wash and dry the dishes. Michael even takes Wolfgang to a petting zoo.
Wolfgang chafes at authority and sometimes throws things the way a peevish boy his age might. But just when you are lulled into an illusion of normalcy, Michael cruelly tells Wolfgang that his parents don’t want him and that they have gotten rid of all his possessions. The boy still writes them letters, which Michael discovers and destroys.
Every time Michael slides open the lock on Wolfgang’s bunker, and the door loudly scrapes open, you get the sinking feeling of being led into a dungeon, which it isn’t; it’s just a boy’s bedroom strewn with toys. In the creepiest scene, Michael is shown alone, watching a pornographic film. A little later, while sitting at the opposite end of a dinner table from Wolfgang, Michael casually exposes himself to the boy and in a cold, menacing voice reiterates an obscene question heard in the movie.
That is the only moment in which something approaching explicit sex between the two takes place. At other times Michael tells Wolfgang to “come here,” and the film abruptly cuts away before the boy even stirs. There is also an adult heterosexual scene at a ski resort, where Michael has an awkward encounter with a woman who later, to his fury, visits his house unannounced.
In refusing to stare directly at sexual abuse, the movie recalls Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games,” in which violence and torture lurked just on the outskirts of the film without ever being shown. That punishing exploration of the voyeuristic imagination was itself a kind of torture visited on audiences primed to gasp and shrink in horror when the camera finally zeroed in on the butchery, which it never did. But how could a movie whose victim is an actual child show the physical abuse perpetrated on Wolfgang? (Mr. Schleinzer has been a casting director for several of Mr. Haneke’s films.)
This movie has no beginning or back story. It just follows Michael into his home one day as he enters with bags of groceries. He has a steady midlevel job at a bland insurance office, where he is treated with respect. Over the five months spanned by the story, he wins a promotion.
Mr. Fuith’s dour performance portrays Michael as a watchful, nerdy introvert susceptible to sudden spasms of rage and terror. Hearing an expert on child abuse speaking on television, he becomes extremely agitated and turns off the set.
Another chilling scene observes Michael on the prowl at a miniature-car racetrack, where boys congregate mostly with their fathers. As he stalks the fringes, you remember those bunk beds and imagine he might be contemplating taking a second captive, and the thought is unbearable.
This coldly compelling film doesn’t try to explain Michael’s behavior or analyze his disease. As if doing penance for Michael’s sins, it eventually metes out unequivocal punishment, but it is small consolation
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