L'Enfant (The Child)

Name: L'Enfant (The Child)
Genre: Drama, Romance, Crime
Released: March 24, 2006
Duration: 100 min
Rating: 87
Cast: Déborah François, Jérémie Renier

2006

METASCORE

Universal acclaim based on 34 Critics

See All

USER SCORE

Universal acclaim based on 83 Ratings

See All

8.7

VOTE NOW

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

8.7	Your Score
8.7	User Score Universal acclaim based on 83 Ratings

Would you like to write a review?

There is a 75 character minimum for reviews. If your review contains spoilers, please check the Spoiler box. Please do not use ALL CAPS. There is no linking or other HTML allowed. Your review may be edited for content. 0/5000

Check box if your review contains spoilers

Please enter your birth date to watch this video:

You are not allowed to view this material at this time.

L' Enfant (The Child)

Movie Details & Credits

Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: March 24, 2006

Starring: Déborah François, Jérémie Renier

Summary: Dispossessed twenty-year old Bruno lives with his eighteen-year-old girlfriend Sonia in Seraing, an eastern Belgian steel town. They live off Sonia's unemployment benefits and the panhandling and petty theft committed by Bruno and his gang. Their lives change forever when Sonia gives birth to their child, Jimmy. [Sony Pictures Classics]

Director: Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne

Genre(s): Drama, Romance, Crime

Rating: R

Runtime: 100 min

See All Details and Credits

Awards & Rankings

8	#8 Best Movie of 2006

Watch Now

Buy On

Stream On

Metascore

Positive:

Mixed:

Negative:

Critic Reviews

100

Chicago Reader - Jonathan Rosenbaum

Whether the title refers to the baby or the thief remains an open question, and the viewer is left to decide whether the theme of redemption should be perceived in Christian terms. This builds to a suspenseful climax, and as in Hitchcock's best work, that suspense is morally inflected. Read full review

100

New York Daily News - Jami Bernard

Powerfully uplifting precisely because it's so horrifying. Read full review

100

The A.V. Club - Noel Murray

L'Enfant is intended as a pointed critique of pop culture's celebration of arrested adolescence. The title could refer to Renier's baby, Renier himself, or even the gang of schoolboy robbers that he's gathered around himself. Read full review

Miami Herald - Rene Rodriguez

Doesn't feel so much like a movie as a glimpse into the extraordinarily messed-up life of a young man about to make the simple yet life-changing realization that actions have consequences, and that other people matter, too. Read full review

Variety - Scott Foundas

Those masters of small-scale realism, Belgian brothers Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne, have created yet another beautifully acted, exquisitely observed morality tale in The Child. Read full review

Dallas Observer - Rob Nelson

Tough as it is, L'Enfant nudges both its protagonist and its audience toward unlikely affection. Tough as it is, L'Enfant commands our care by practicing what it preaches. No wonder the brothers call it a love story. Read full review

The New Yorker - Anthony Lane

There is something willed and implausible at the heart of L’Enfant, beginning with the child himself--the first non-crying, non-hungry infant in human history, let alone in cinema. Read full review

SEE ALL 34 REVIEWS

Write a Review

User Reviews

TomC.

Apr 14, 2006

This movie was a moving experience! Will stay wiith me for quite a while. No doubt who 'The Child' that the title refers to really is!