France in the winter of 1919, after the Armistice of Compiège but before the Treaty of Versailles. Prescott’s father is part of Woodrow Wilson’s US delegation, which together with their allies should formally conclude World War I. Prescott proves to be a puerile tyrant and choleric – whenever something does not comply with his wishes, the seven year old is overcome by a fit of rage.
The actor Brady Corbet (Funny Games USA, Clouds of Sils Maria) shows us three of these fits – one worse than the other – in his directorial debut. What such excitations can lead to is revealed in an epilogue of frenzy and terror: an evocation of totalitarian grandeur, radiating dreadfully after all the darkness that came before. Jean Paul Sartre’s early novella L'Enfance d'un chef (from the collection of stories «Le Mur» published 1939) serves as the framework for this film. According to the final credits, the filmmakers also consulted Robert Musil and Hannah Arendt. All names whose works describe the terrifying spirit of the 20th century, which Corbet invokes in the form of a sometimes filmily, sometimes moldy sensuality.
