So am I supposed to identify with a bunch of kidnappers?
(spoilers, obviously)
I can't deny that this movie was gorgeous - the colors of the fields, the attention to the little animals that lived there, the beautiful sky. The kids were all pretty good actors (I read somewhere that most of them weren't professionals?) and spoke as I assume children would.
However, I was so consumed by hate for the parents & other adults that I found it distracting. I'm not the type that demands movie-makers change their message to please the audience, so I'm not exactly complaining about the plot. However, I had ZERO sympathy for the parents, for the mom crying about how her son should leave when he's older, for the father's grief when he accidentally shot his son (I felt bad for Michele, of course). I couldn't identify with them at all. How can you value the life of your own children, but be ready to kill someone else's child for (presumably) money? How can you just leave him in a hole? I don't really care how many "reservations" the kidnappers seemed to have, the bottom line is that they made a choice to execute that poor kid instead of leave him wandering around in a city or something.
Michele's reaction was odd too - he was 10 years old. Why was his first reaction not to tell anyone about the boy in the hole? I don't get it. If he was younger, I might understand. But 10 is old enough to know right from wrong and reality from fantasy. His complacence (until the end) was somewhat shocking to me as well.
They're coming to get you, Barbara!