For many coming-of-age stories, there’s the dream of growing up, getting out of your comfort zone, and finding purpose, success, or maybe, just the simple case to earn enough money for a better life. It’s this dream that makes 7 Prisoners such a harrowing coming-of-age drama. The plot feels reminiscent of something Charles Dickens would have written, but writer-director Alexandre Moratto focuses more on the characters with the lever in their respective trolley problems, which male lead Christian Malheiros takes with such a dynamic performance, and which Moratto takes to a more depressing end. 7 Prisoners is much more bleak compared to many coming-of-age stories, but it’s one that works as a necessary exposé of a real life social issue that the world should have solved long long before.

The way Moratto crafts and cultivates a bleak mood as each situation swaps out for a heavier moral dilemma for Mateus, and as his boss Lucas has gone through the same thing.