Alternate Best Actor 2002: Olivier Gourmet in The Son

Olivier Gourmet did not receive an Oscar nomination, despite winning Cannes, for portraying Olivier in The Son.

The Son follows a carpenter instructor taking interest in one of his students at a rehab school.

The Dardenne brothers take a matter of fact approach in their film-making, though their actual subjects typically touch the melodramatic in terms of content though not in execution. We have that here as we have Olivier Gourmet portraying the character of Olivier. Now Gourmet is the directors' most frequent collaborator, though the sizes of his roles differ. This is his largest as the lead, and leading to the point that the directors essentially stay within Olivier's view almost throughout the film. Now the central crux of the film is a rather extreme one this as the boy that Olivier takes interest in was imprisoned originally for having killed Olivier's son in a robbery. Gourmet's performance is a curious and fascinating one. This as even with this knowledge his character is not one we can immediately understand. This is that he has no inner monologue and most of his spoken words a perfunctory. This as he largely talks about directly what he is doing as a carpenter rather than revealing anything about himself. This then leads us to examine Gourmet's work which essentially must create so much of the film's drama, almost all of it through his mostly silent performance. This as we immediately see him it appears he might just be a rather firm and tough teacher. This with a sense of conviction in his manner of a good teacher though with a force about him particularly as he speaks to the certain boy Francis.

This is though as we follow him it is obviously not just any normal student as he not only demands that the student spend more time with him in the school, we follow Olivier as he follows him around. Gourmet though is incredible in the way his manner is a whole lot of things at once in these scenes of following the boy around. There is firstly the weight of his expression that bares a grief that is unspoken but obviously within him. There is the awkwardness of a man essentially being a stalker without really the ability or manner appropriate for such an act. This in as he moves around in fidgeting and nervous way. Gourmet's performance emphasizes that while the man is doing this, there probably is not an assured sense of why he is doing this. There is though in that a strange conviction about it, an intensity that Gourmet brings. This intensity that is particularly well realized as it is not of some traditional revenge seeker, but rather a man with a sense of confusion and though also hate in intensity. We see this stalking inter-spliced with the moments of just Olivier teaching. There he's terrific in showing the man more so in his normal state where he offers almost even a warmth just in the manner in which he attempts to show the boy the methods of his craft. This though even there is still the sense in his eyes the man's focus upon the boy that obviously isn't normal.

We are not told Olivier's plan, even when called upon it, Gourmet accentuates the confusion and more than anything an inability to speak in the moment. This naturally intensifies when he takes Francis on a road trip to pick up wood, and this extended sequence is tremendous work from Gourmet. This as Gourmet's, again basically silent, performance takes us through the steps in his mind as he looks upon the boy. There is a great moment where he takes almost a instinctual attack by stopping the car short. In the moment Gourmet's eyes just intensifies for a second showing it as this almost subconscious moment. Through the trip though inter-spliced between questions about craft Olivier does ask about the boy's crimes. Gourmet delivers this so well with a calm understatement of just man conversing with the troubled boy, though again with his eyes he finds the nuance of someone looking for answers. Eventually he takes the boy to the secluded supply area where Olivier suddenly reveals his connection to the boy as the father of his victim. I love Gourmet's delivery again even in this is almost random as though his mind has just pulled this from him. We see the same as he then attempts to chase the boy who naturally runs upon hearing this. Gourmet is fantastic by how natural he makes the complete chaos he displays in Olivier's "plan". This as he speaks that he won't hurt the boy wholly earnestly, however it is with a real intensity that when he does catch the boy he begins to choke him. Gourmet's performance makes sense of the senseless essentially, as any behavior is given a truth about it by showing the man's mind as randomly trying to come to a personal conclusion on his wound. The problem is there is no real solution. Gourmet is incredible as Olivier doesn't kill the boy, however immediately afterwards his whole scene of breathing alone says so much. This as Gourmet is searing with the sense of anger still in the man even as the man returns to essentially his life by preparing the wood again. The final moment is essential in this as when the boy returns, his look is not one of forgiveness but rather we see a man choosing to move forward. This is a truly striking performance as Olivier Gourmet work create an honesty in a man basically being senseless in reacting to senselessness. He avoids being vague, but rather finds something truly powerful in a man wandering around trying and failing to figure out what to do.