First overwhelming. Then unfocused.

Rating: Null/10 (11 December 2017)

*SPOILERS*
The movie has two very distinct parts. In and out of the room.
In the first part we are shown the mother and her kid stuck in that room and the situation becomes almost overwhelming to the viewer. We learn through his eyes what the room is for him: his entire world. We learn how things like TV make sense to him and we learn that these stories were told to him by his mother, rather than the cruel truth. Of course this must be a seven year long nightmare to her, but for some reason it hurts almost more to see the boy, Jack, not knowing anything about the world outside. Although it is fiction, it still gives you a gut punch, because similar cases really happened. I have to admit I didn't even think about cinematography (a very good sign for a captivating movie), because the situation just takes over your brain. But, of course, the camera work brilliantly portrays their claustrophobic prison.
The rather rushed escape is very tense, the movie handled it perfectly.
Then we enter the second part, where the movie crumbles a bit. First the boy is confused and understandably scared by what is around him. Nothing makes sense to Jack and the performance of the young actor is just absolutely convincing. It is kind of heartbreaking when he asks when they can go back to the room.
Jack's level of comfort rises slowly, as does his relation with other humans (and animals). He seems to be less fixated on his mother and I'm not sure how realistic this whole development would be from a psychological standpoint. I mean: This is the only other human he knew for his entire life (as he said, he was never sure if the rapist was real or like the people from TV.) At the same time the mental state of the mother suffers, fueled by regret, memories and mostly by (silent) blame of others and herself. It should be noted that the media people behaved absolutely disgustingly - as I'm sure they would if all this was real.
It was a good decision to feature the life outside of the room rather than ending the movie after the escape. Life is not instantaneously perfect for them. But all this felt a bit unfocused. The movie doesn't really build up to anything. For example: it's only a couple of minutes between her trying to kill herself and then being completely healthy again. And then we have a happy ending.