This film delves into the turbulent life of seven-year-old Robert Oliver and his family in impoverished Europa, Mississippi. Robert’s mother turned over custody of both Robert and his brother to their grandmother, Anna, who granted filmmaker Rory Kennedy exceptional access to their lives. Suffering from extreme personality and behavior disorders and potently medicated, Robert has attempted suicide and killed several of the family’s cats and dogs. As the film unfolds over the course of two years, we learn that Anna has mental problems of her own—in one chilling scene she taunts Robert to fire a gun—complicating the efforts of Robert’s therapist and teachers to unearth the origins of his disorders. At times difficult to watch, the film reveals painful intersections between mental illness and emotional abuse, and encourages us to question the point at which society ought to intervene.  ST