It begins with a sobbing seven-year-old girl hugging her older brother and then her father before heading into school for the first time. They are the first of a few hugs in this film. Hugs so tight, so desperate, you want to cry. For this playground can be a battleground: within minutes there is talk of turf wars, snitches and death threats. With her debut feature, Belgian director Laura Wandel has created one of the most immersive film experiences in a long time, even if, credits aside, it’s a mere 68 minutes long. What nail-biting, heart-tugging minutes they are.
For the most part, Nora (Maya Vanderbeque) doesn’t understand what’s going on — why her brother Abel (Günter Duret) is being bullied, or why he won’t stand up for himself, or why he won’t tell their father about it, or why he’s bullying other kids. She is dealing, for the first time in her life, with lying, shame and betrayal, her youthful happiness and innocence being gradually corroded. And every second of it feels painfully real.
An emotional barrage that will bring out your most primal protective urges.
From the start it feels like a beautifully shot documentary, and some of it kind of is — Wandel filmed so much, sometimes the kids forgot the camera was there, and just kept talking, playing. Vanderbeque is impossibly great, not a shred of artifice on show. And the filmmaking itself feels almost invisible, all shot from Vanderbeque’s eye-level, the camera strapped to cinematographer Frédéric Noirhomme’s waist. Playground literally does not look down on these kids, placing us right in the trenches with them, closely, intimately, meaning we’re more engulfed by their world than observing it. And much of the time we barely see the bullies, the camera staying on the faces of the bullied. It is acutely empathetic filmmaking.
This is tender, sensitive, non-judgmental work. At 68 minutes, there’s certainly no fat on it. Yet still, it’s an emotional barrage that will bring out your most primal protective urges. Towards the end, you realise there’s been no score whatsoever. It doesn’t need such enhancement or manipulation. The ambient sound of the playground is terrifying enough.