Amy (Naomi Watts) and her husband, Peter (Naomi Watts), live in the suburbs with their adopted son, Luce (Kelvin Harrison). Mrs. Wilson (Octavia Spencer), Luce's high school teacher, becomes suspicious when she reads an essay that Luce wrote that defended the pro-violence of writer/political philosopher Franz Fanon. She gets even more suspicious of Luce and comes to conclusions about him when she opens his locker and discovers a bag of fireworks inside.

      Writer/director Julius Onah and co-writer J.C. Lee leave a lot of room for interpretation because you never know whom to trust among the characters. They're all flawed in their own ways and, just when you think you have them figured out, they take you by surprise. They have more than meet's the eye, including Mrs. Wilson who has to deal with her mentally ill sister. When Luce and his parents go to a meeting with Mrs. Wilson and a school administrator, the complex dynamics between Luce and his family start rising the surface. Who's the abuser? Who's the enabler? The answers aren't quite clear, but there are many possibilities to consider. Luce has toxic relationships with his parents, and there's even a scene with covert sexual abuse which raises even more questions about the true nature of Luce and his mother's relationship. Amy and Peter also have a dysfunctional relationship with each other as husband and wife, and the tensions that arise after Mrs. Wilson's accusations only magnify that rift.

      Onah and Lee have woven a complex, intriguing psychological thriller that's slow-burning up until its very dark third act. It's not a bold as the ending of Arlington Road, but it comes close. Both Luce and Arlington Road are smart thrillers that gradually build suspense and a sense of paranoia while remaining grounded in humanism. There are Hitchcockian elements to both films which makes for a suspenseful roller coaster ride as seemingly ordinary people are thrust into unexpectedly tense conflicts and become anything but ordinary nor what you expected them to be by the time the end credits roll. The screenplay trusts the audience's intelligence and imagination, but when it comes to trusting their emotions, that's a whole other matter because the grating soundtrack feels intrusive, overbearing and even repetitive. If its goal were to annoy the audience, it succeeds at that, but what's the purpose does annoying them serve? Fortunately, the performances, especially by Harrison, are strong and convincingly moving without a hammy or stilted performance in sight. The title of Luce in Israel translates as "The Truth Has Many Faces" which is a very accurate way of describing the film's fundamental message. Very few things in life are purely black-and-white, and the same can be said about everything that transpires in Luce.