Any reference to "In Living Color" dates me terribly, but my first reaction when the credits started rolling on L'Enfant was to channel Wayans and Grier with a rousing chorus of "Hated it!" I know that's too low-brow for fine foreign cinema, so let me explain. A friend and former employer of mine once commented wisely on a movie we attended together in New York - it was some talking head psychodrama in the spirit of Magnolia or Short Cuts. He said, "If I wanted to see a bunch of screwed up people trying to get through their lives, I could have looked out my window." The comment had some weight if you knew the East Village at that time. Any city these days has its visible malcontents and wayward lambs. Americans all over their great country have the dubious pleasure of recognizing on some level that the lifestyle portrayed on TV sitcoms is not a reality for many folks.

Seeing depravity on screen in French isn't that much different than seeing it in Anglais. My picks for shining examples of this dramasub genre include Morvern Callar, Hana-Bi and You, Me and Everyone We Know. Throw Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer in there as well. Any film that aims to expose characters with a questionable or corrupt moral compass is drawing the same well water as L'Enfant. When it works, it reminds us that the way people perceive our actions tends to trump our ability to rationalize most everything we do as justified and "right." If you're a down-in-the-mouth Belgian, as is the main character of L'Enfant, it may make perfect sense to trade your infant of nine days for a quick Euro. We the viewers are supposed to be horrified. We are. Of course. What L'Enfant lacks is any further revelation or depth. In fact, I think L'Enfant commits the ultimate sin of what I'll heretofore refer to as the "Feel-Bad Psychodrama" (FeebPsych) genre. Bruno, after committing several acts of moral depravity, seems to be finding his moral center somehow at the end of the movie. Look: He does good deeds! He weeps with remorse! Are we to believe that in the span of roughly 90 minutes Bruno has become a productive member of Belgian society? Surely by the sequel he'll be driving a Peugot to his office job and feeding hot, greasy fries to Baby Jimmy...

Trying to portray shaky moral ground, L'Enfant comes across equally shaky. To its credit, the actors' performances are strong and there is no soft-peddling the initial message against any type of society that would force its members to live like Bruno and Sonia. I prefer the films that show how people caught in the works of society are still marked more by the choices they make. Morvern Callar is a great example of how the line between fortune and misfortune is largely a personal invention. People like Bruno and Sonia are not slaves and no amount of social commentary will erase the reality of Europe as one big welfare state. The experience of watching screwed up people trying to get through their lives may be a fulfilling cinematic vision for you, and L'Enfant will fit that bill nicely. And maybe the revelation of the movie is that there is no revelation...