SCFZ

The early scene that sets the tone of the film, is seeing a set of children chase a German Shepard, at first possibly innocent play, before they corner the dog and shoot it multiple times as it whimpers. Our lead, a young orphan, already established to have been German as he was transported on a train containing German POWs, come upon them as the children glee at the death of a German dog. Once the other children have left, the young blonde child looks at the tag, sees that it has a Swastika and removes it, keeping it for himself.

Arriving at the orphanage the director is horrified to read his paperwork and changes his name, informing the child that he must pretend to be Yugoslavian and never, ever give his past away. This works for a while and he is welcomed by the other children and starts to form friendships with them as we see their sympathetic faces, feel their plight, sadness and loss - along with the hope of family members possibly being alive to get them. For a while, it feels very much like many of the Eastern Block films focused on child friendships and the repercussions of world war 2, but simple pranks slowly start to escalate, and suspicions that the young blonde boy may not be who he says he is, adds in a creeping sense of danger.

Even more so than the ending, the most disturbing moment of the film comes in the final act when all innocence and any doubt of the nature of the film is removed in a crushing and horrifying attempted rape sequence. Starting as a normal scene in the lockerroom, the tension between the children and the director's wife turns violent as they push her to the floor and hold her down, while one of the boys tries to climb on top of her and lift her skirt. These are all children, some young teens, and the imagery is not only disgusting but in light of the sympathy built for these children previously, soul-crushing.

From this moment on we know the children are capable of anything - and no one is willing to stop them. Our protagonist too, while not participating in the event, merely stands there and watches until the director comes in and has to whip the children away with his belt. Repercussions for this event are not seen as everything starts to escalate too fast. Our protagonist discovers that the other children have ransacked his bed and found the proof of what he is, and before he can find the director again, he is cornered and put on "trial", where the children place a gas mask on his face and stop the air as a torture mechanism to get him to confess - a confession they get - though slowly.

Leading the German away, it becomes clear the children, or at least some of them, are intent to kill him - and command him to walk down a pathway as they raise a gun prepared to shoot him in the back. The director shows up in time just to intervene and gets the gun away from them in time for the German boy to flee - in a scene tense because you think they may just shoot the director as well. The scene does once more reveal a little weakness in the children, but it is for nought as even after, with the German boy sprinting for his life stones start flying towards him and suddenly we see children, all in gas masks, running after him. The tension builds and builds as they get closer and closer, the sun continues to envelop everying around them, and just as they are about to catch up, light overtakes the screen.