SONNER/SONS
Norway, 2006, 103 minutes, Colour.
Nils Jørgen Kaalstad, Mikkel Bratt Silset, Edward Schultheiss
Directed by Erik Richter Strand.
Sons is a strong film about male predators of young boys. It is set in a Norwegian town, opening in a public baths where one of the lifeguards is suspicious of a man prowling and swimming with the youngsters. It emerges that he had been molested by this man when he was young. And it later emerges that his fellow lifeguard had been molested.
Lars, the lifeguard, gets a camera and photographs the predator in action, going to another victim who now works for a television station, asking him to play the material but to blur the face of the victim. Lars had previously encountered the victim after a group prank, boys peering into the shower room for the women at the baths. The boy, Tim, had knocked over a woman who was bitter about her injury, with Lars urging Tom to apologize and being able to continue to come to the baths.
There is also his fellow-lifeguards girlfriend who is pregnant, and who is the boss, and she fries him. With his own girlfriend as confidante, he decides to pursue the predators and expose them. Once again he encounters Tim and rescues him, even though Tim says he does not want to be rescued.
This is a strong theme of the film, the willingness or unwillingness of the boys to go along with the predator, often seeing him as someone interested in them more than their family, as a father-figure. However, the predator is given lines which attempt to justify his behaviour, that this happens in all societies, the society takes it for granted, that the boys are willing collaborators. The predator has photos of all his victims on his computer bringing Lars to memories of his past, for his friend who finally admits his being abused and this instigates his outburst of anger on the predator.
The media also invents a group of vigilantes, the anti-Pedo Action Group. This actually excites Lars as he goes on his crusade, the drama being brought to a head when he has to rescue Tim from the predator and a gun is drawn.
The ending is open, audiences wondering what will happen to the predator, what Lars will actually do, what will happen to Tim.
