The Fatherless

Writer-director Kreutzer’s feature debut starts very well, with a dying elderly man visited by a doctor who, it transpires, is his son. Indeed, the first half of the film, in which the rest of the man’s offspring gather for the funeral, including an estranged sister the others hitherto knew nothing about, sets the scene for what looks likely to be an engaging study of shifting allegiances, misunderstandings and revelations, complete with flashbacks to the ’80s, when the family were part of a commune. Thereafter, however,  the narrative becomes increasingly contrived, even implausible, and what might have been an incisive look at the consequences  of changing values feels rather too neat and predictable.