FAQ

My Son is loosely based on the real life story of Mark Yavorsky, an actor who killed his mother with an antique sword in a re-enactment of a scene from the Greek tragedy Orestes in which a son slays his mother in revenge for the death of his father. The screenplay was written by Herbert Golder, a professor of Classical Civilization at Boston University, and German filmmaker Werner Herzog, who also directed the movie. The title is from the Euripides play Herakles. After Herakles has murdered his wife and his children, his father says, "My son, my son, what have ye done?"

After the Robertses (Loretta Devine and Irma P. Hall) describe to Detective Havenhurst (Willem Dafoe) how Brad (Michael Shannon) ran his sword through his mother (Grace Zabriskie) while the four of them were having coffee together, the SWAT team leader ushers Ingrid (Chloë Sevigny) and Lee (Udo Kier) in front of the house in an attempt to talk with Brad and coax him to come out and to release the hostages. Brad shouts back that he's still feeding them, Ingrid realizes that the hostages are Brad's pet flamingos, McNamara and McDougal. Brad then releases the flamingos through the front door, and the SWAT team closes in on him. As he's being placed in the squad car, Brad asks Havenhurst to include two things in his report: (1) that he substitutes running ostriches for the flamingos, and (2) the fate of the basketball he left in Balboa Park. In the final scene, a woman is shown photographing the basketball where it is perched in the tree. She is followed by a young boy who lifts the ball out of tree and walks off with it.

No diagnosis is provided in the movie. Ingrid says that he was depressed and everyone agrees that he began acting strangely after his return from Peru. Based on the bizarreness of Brad's thoughts and actions and his admission that he was hearing voices and saw God, most viewers believe him to be suffering from some form of schizophrenia. Mark Yavorksy, the man whose case inspired the movie, was found innocent by reason of insanity and spent seven years at Patton State Hospital in San Bernardino County, California.

Those who have seen the movie agree that it can be understood on several levels. The most obvious one is the problem of social complacency, i.e., how the people around Brad, such as his girlfriend and play director, were oblivious to his mental state. Even though they could see that he was deeply troubled, they viewed him only as being eccentric and disruptive. Others focus on Brad's bizarre relationship with his mother, one that bordered on child abuse and may have led to Brad's inability to relate to the rest of world in normal ways. Hence his descent into a non-reality where he assumed the role of Orestes, a role in which he was originally cast as an actor. A third interpretation, based on the fact that his condition became noticeable after his return from Peru, is that Brad became possessed or influenced by ancient spirits near Machu Picchu.