In their first film since the acclaimed Palme d'Or-winning Rosetta, Belgian film-making brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne have found the perfect subject for their pared down visual aesthetic in The Son (Le Fils).

A subtle and disquieting film about a working class man whose life has been devastated by tragedy, The Son offers an enigmatic and morally complex study of human emotions.

Olivier (Olivier Gourmet), is an experienced carpenter. He teaches at a rehabilitation centre where he is a good tutor, reasonable and patient. His refusal to take on a seemingly appropriate boy, called Francis (Morgan Marinne) appears puzzling, especially as Olivier then takes to following him in the training centre hallways and along the streets of LiÈge. The film focuses on the ambiguous relationship that develops between them until we gradually learn that the young man is somehow implicated in Olivier's past.