This year the Virginia Film Festival brought Charlottesville a true wonder with the 2012 Dutch film, “The Zigzag Kid.” The film was one of three at the festival made from a Jewish perspective, but its message resonated with all audience members, encouraging them to embrace their individuality.
The plot centers on young Nono (Thomas Simon), a 13-year-old boy with creativity and spirit to spare. Nono hopes to follow in his father’s footsteps and become the greatest inspector in the world. Though he loves his father, Jacob (Fedja van Huêt), Nono wonders why he was never told about mother, the mysterious Zohara (Camille De Pazzis). Considering the rest of his reserved, humdrum relatives, Nono wonders how he got his colorful imagination and free-spirited personality. He suspects the answer may lie in finally discovering more about his mother.
While on a train en route to his boring Uncle Sjmoel’s house, Nono finds a letter wrapped around a bar of Luxor chocolate. This letter promises to send him on a whirlwind adventure, one that will train him to follow in his father’s footsteps as the world’s greatest detective and simultaneously prepare him for his upcoming Bar Mitzvah. On the way, he teams up with the notorious criminal mastermind Felix Glick (Burghart Klaußner) and glamorous grande dame Lola Ciperola (Isabella Rossellini). “The Zigzag Kid” succeeds in bringing new life to the lesson that there is just as much to gain from the journey as from finally reaching the destination.
Director Vincent Bal does a spectacular job of capturing the elegance and excitement of travel. Nono and his accomplices race across a luxury-car-driving, evening-dress-wearing, croissant-eating Europe, creating a continental adventure just as rich and fun as Nono’s imagination.
Bal and the film’s all-star cast deserve all possible praise for infusing Nono’s adventures with both tremendous comedy and true feeling. Nono is a boy in search of himself, and Simon plays his first major role with impressive sensitivity and intelligence. He captures the complexity of Nono’s relationship with his father, striving to make him proud while remaining true to himself.
Bal does not sweep such serious subjects under the rug. As Nono pursues the truth behind his mother’s absence and his own feeling of not quite fitting in, he must come to terms with the reality beyond his imagination. The world, he learns, is not always pretty and carefree. Val’s film, however, is as bright and stunning as possible.
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