Going into "We Need to Talk About Kevin" (110 min.), I knew very generally what the theme of the movie was (Kevin is a troubled kid and he is going to do something horrible) but purposefully I did not know any of the plot details as I wanted to movie to surprise me. Boy, did the movie surprise me!

The first 20-25 min. of the movie are absolutely transfixing, as there is hardly any conversation, and there are miltiple story lines going on at the same time. The picture that eventually emerges is one where Eva (Kevin's mom) is dealing with the traumas of whatever Kevin has done (we don't know until much later in the movie what that is), and also, in flashbacks, reflecting on how Kevin grew up (and why he turned out the way he did, and of course where there was anything she could've done better or differently). The acting in the movie is mostly outstanding, with Tilda Swinton as Eva, but the 3 actors who portray Kevin are equally effective, none more so in my opition than Jasper Newell as six to eight year old Kevin.

This is a chilly and devastating movie, but oh-so-good. I was literally frozen into my chair as I watched this movie unfold. Given the general premise of the movie, and the fact that there really isn't a single uplifting moment in it, it is amazing that this movie even got made at all (and not so amazing that a good part of the funding came from BBC Films, apparently). Also a special mention that the music score was done by Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood. In all, if you like off-center movies that are not your typical Hollywood main fare with happy ending, by all means, check this movie out. "We Need To Talk About Kevin" is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

What is it that we always hear? Not just from friends, but especially in movies and TV shows about parenting. It's that there's "no guidebook" to being a parent. You just have to do your best and learn as you go. That assumes a level of parental instinct exists on even the most basic level, but what if there isn't? What if you hate your child? What if your child hates you and everything else just as much?

In We Need to Talk About Kevin, that emotional deficit leads to nightmarish consequences, the kind that would leave any rational parent breaking out in a drenching cold sweat. When we first meet Eva(Tilda Swinton), she seems adrift in this world. For unknown reasons she's hated and ridiculed by the people she meets on the street. In the heavily used flashbacks we see her during a happier time, spirited and in lust's grip with Franklin(John C. Reilly), the new man in her life. A particularly blissful evening leads to an unexpected pregnancy, marriage, and a fresh start in the suburbs.

From there it's immediately downhill, as their son, Kevin, is a handful from the start. Eva can't stop him from crying, to the point where she takes walks near construction sites just to drown him out. He doesn't listen to her, going out of his way to do the opposite of what she wants. She has no connection with the boy, and as he gets older nothing seems to change. The bond isn't there. She's not built for it, and even if she was, Kevin wouldn't want it. In time he only grows more violent and hateful, especially towards her. The dynamic changes as a little sister enters the family, with Kevin having someone completely defenseless to terrorize. Franklin, a clueless schmo of a husband thinks it's no big deal and that it'll pass. He has no idea how wrong he is, about as wrong as a parent can be about anything.

Marking the long awaited return of Lynne Ramsay as director and based on the novel by Lionel Shriver, the film poses an interesting nature vs. nurture question wrapped in a real life horror story . Was it Eva's lack of maternal guidance that leads Kevin down his murderous path? Or was he just a bad seed destined to go off on a killing spree? No answers are forthcoming, and that never really seems to be the point.

Ramsay, who has been away from the camera for nearly a decade, goes a little too far trying to leave a signature fingerprint on the film's look, bathing it in off-putting colors, specifically heavy reds to foreshadow the upcoming violence. The use of flashbacks and time jumping are overdone and add little to the story's impact. Ramsay's artistic flourishes, including some of the more dreamlike elements as we flash through Eva's memories, feel tacked on and unnecessary.

As many of Tilda Swinton's films tend to be, their success rests solely on her considerable acting talents. Here she is mesmerizing as Eva, a conflicted woman tortured by her own failings, appalled by her hatred for her own son. These are the types of roles Swinton excels at, the ones no other actress would dare to undertake. No one else could play this role and be as believable and haunting as Swinton is. Ezra Miller is woefully miscast as Kevin, however. A likable actor who has done good things before(he's great in City Island), he seems to be fighting to stay on Swinton's level, but ends up snarling and smirking like a bad comic book villain.

We Need to Talk About Kevin is a tough film to endure, not because it's bad but because Swinton's performance is so uncomfortably raw. If there's a reason to see this movie, it's for her.

In an interview with Lionel Shriver' about her highly successful 2005 novel she commented on the difficulty of the project: `It was admittedly draining. And throughout, I was anxious that because I had never had a child myself, I didn't know what I was talking about and readers who were parents would catch me out.' As adapted for the screen by director Lynne Ramsay and Rory Kinnear this story becomes a terrifyingly realistic exploration of the subject of inherent evil and the manner in which we deal with it. The film is particularly timely as we read almost daily of youngsters killing classmates in schools across the country. But first the story:

Eva Khatchadourian (Tilda Swinton) is trying to piece together her life following the "incident". Once a successful travel writer, she is forced to take whatever job comes her way, which of late is as a clerk in a travel agency. She lives a solitary life as people who know about her situation openly shun her, even to the point of violent actions toward her. She, in turn, fosters that solitary life because of the incident, the aftermath of which has turned her into a meek and scared woman. That incident involved her son Kevin Khatchadourian (Ezra Miller as a teenager and Jasper Newell as a 6 year old and Rock Duer as a toddler), who is now approaching his eighteenth birthday. Eva and Kevin have always had a troubled relationship, even when he was an infant. Whatever troubles he saw, Franklin (John C. Reilly), Eva's complacent husband, just attributed it to Kevin being a typical boy. The incident may be seen by both Kevin and Eva as his ultimate act in defiance against his mother.

Ramsay tells her story in bits and pieces of a collage of moments from the birth of Kevin to his incarceration. For some this kind of non-linear story telling may be disconcerting, but for this viewer it seems like a close examination of the mind of a mother who simply cannot believe she has birthed and is raising a child who is the epitome of evil. The fact that we are aware of something hideous that has happened from the beginning does not get in the way of watching the slow maturation of Kevin - first as a constantly screaming infant to a maliciously bad little boy to a viciously cruel and evil teenager with whom his mother cannot connect except for one very telling instance when she reads the young Kevin `Robin Hood' and his arrows, at which point Kevin shows a degree of affection for Eva. That moment proves in retrospect to be the nidus for the horror that lies ahead. Yet to say more about the story wound diminish the impact one the viewer. Tilda Swinton is extraordinary in her role as is Ezra Miller. The film. At least, for this viewer, is a powerfully disturbing one and a very fine insight into how evil deeds can happen. Grady Harp, June 12