Truely heartbreaking, a horror told as a drama

Rating: 10/10 (28 March 2020)

I like a lot about this movie, and I think a lot of people should see it so I'll keep this brief.
They made a lot of smart directorial choices with this film. The story of the movie could have very easily been told in the horror genre, and I feel that I have seen that many times. Being told as a drama instead, this felt first hand and personal. They put very little focus on the villain, and told the story from the perspective of the child. I like that they give no real screen time to him, taking the romanticizing out of the equation. It's heartbreaking to see how the boy who has very little world knowledge and mental maturity handles dark subject matter like rape, kidnapping, mental and physicsl abuse.
I love the that by the halfway mark, they focus on reintroducing the child to normal society. Most movies would choose to end after the main characters escape their captor. I like that this movie took a psychological approach to the aftermath that this kind of abuse would cause. In a lot of movies, the big climax is defeating the villain and the movie ends and we are meant to believe it's happily ever after. This movie showed the dark, hard life of someone who survived true horrors and how the pain never really ends.
This movie will make you cry. It's very powerful and important.