It begins with a sobbing seven-year-old woman hugging her older brother after which her father earlier than heading into college for the primary time. They’re the primary of some hugs on this movie. Hugs so tight, so determined, you need to cry. For this playground generally is a battleground: inside minutes there may be discuss of turf wars, snitches and dying threats. Along with her debut function, Belgian director Laura Wandel has created probably the most immersive movie experiences in a very long time, even when, credit apart, it’s a mere 68 minutes lengthy. What nail-biting, heart-tugging minutes they’re.

For essentially the most half, Nora (Maya Vanderbeque) doesn’t perceive what’s occurring — why her brother Abel (Günter Duret) is being bullied, or why he received’t rise up for himself, or why he received’t inform their father about it, or why he’s bullying different children. She is dealing, for the primary time in her life, with mendacity, disgrace and betrayal, her youthful happiness and innocence being steadily corroded. And each second of it feels painfully actual.

From the beginning it looks like a superbly shot documentary, and a few of it sort of is — Wandel filmed a lot, typically the youngsters forgot the digital camera was there, and simply saved speaking, taking part in. Vanderbeque is impossibly nice, not a shred of artifice on present. And the filmmaking itself feels virtually invisible, all shot from Vanderbeque’s eye-level, the digital camera strapped to cinematographer Frédéric Noirhomme’s waist. Playground actually doesn’t look down on these children, inserting us proper within the trenches with them, intently, intimately, that means we’re extra engulfed by their world than observing it. And far of the time we barely see the bullies, the digital camera staying on the faces of the bullied. It’s acutely empathetic filmmaking.

That is tender, delicate, non-judgmental work. At 68 minutes, there’s definitely no fats on it. But nonetheless, it’s an emotional barrage that can deliver out your most primal protecting urges. In direction of the top, you realise there’s been no rating in any respect. It doesn’t want such enhancement or manipulation. The ambient sound of the playground is terrifying sufficient.