As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

The first must-see film of the year.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

A typical European pretentious "message movie", except I've no clue what the message could be? Here's a list of possible messages: 1. If you find a foreign boy who is wounded and running away from drug-smugglers, it's best to call the police, or at least tell your parents about it.2. If you shoot a boy, make sure you check he's dead, because a rich adopted girl living in ther woods could find him, nurse him, have sex with him, and then... NOT call the police.3. If you want to have pedophiles watch your movies, get your 13 year-old actress to take all her clothes off and have sex with a 13 year-old boy.4. 13 year-old Afghan boys who are mortally wounded in the stomach are perfectly capable of having sex - for the first time - just hours before they die, with their new-found Dutch girlfriends.The movie has barely any dialogue, as is typical of so many European, especially Scandinavian dramas (yeah, I know, Holland is not in Scandinavia, but it's close enough). However, the movie is sufficiently strange as to be watchable, in spite of its absurd premises.Naturally, the movie ends tragically. Anyone surprised?How many pedophilic internet forums discuss/worship this movie? I wonder...

POSSIBLE SPOILERS: I gave this movie 5 stars because it's equal parts good and bad. This is a road trip movie about first love between two teenagers from different worlds.. except one doesn't speak English. In fact, he doesn't seem to do much of anything except get shot, look confused, and then look angry. I found it difficult to feel much for him. It was a shame he was forced into such a terrible situation, but no real attempt was made to develop him beyond that. Fortunately, more is revealed about the girl's personality. The girl's parents are a little odd and don't seem to mind having a black leather jacket clad gangster wander around their property at night. Half the gangsters looking for the kids in this movie disappear as it goes on and we only learn the fate of a couple of them with the main gangster only bookending the film and completely disappearing in the middle. But there wasn't a lot to their characters anyway (though it would've been nice to at least know what became of them or see them get their comeuppance). The drug use by the boy and girl didn't bother me (it didn't look like they were enjoying themselves very much there at the end) but the nudity did surprise me. And the tragic scene immediately after the sex made me laugh aloud. I couldn't help it, it seemed too conveniently dramatic to be taken seriously. I did like the menstruation theme that ran through the whole film and thought it was cleverly used at times and I thought the very end was interesting. Overall, if there had been more dialogue and more happenings on the road trip I would've liked it better.

If there was a message the director of "Moonlight" was trying to put across, I missed it. However, one thing is certain, I got my fill of two kids' bathroom habits (or lack thereof.) We are not told why a young 13-year old girl, who is obviously loved by her parents and well-taken care of, decides to secretly harbor a young boy who has been shot once in the leg and once in the abdomen. Why she doesn't tell her parents remains a mystery. Of course, how she determined the boy's wounds were a result of being shot is even a more perplexing mystery. He doesn't speak English (or any other language in which she is apparently fluent.) This film begins with a very absorbing plot, but unfortunately the birds ate all its breadcrumbs, and inevitably along with its viewers, the film becomes fatally lost.

'Moonlight' is (so far) the only movie I've ever seen that was shot in Luxembourg, but I fervently hope it's not a typical example of Luxembourgeoise cinema. This movie is a lot more arty-tarty than it needs to be. For starters, the title is nearly irrelevant: some of the action takes place in a house named Mondschein ('moonlight'), but that name is completely arbitrary and unrelated to the plot.SPOILERS COMING. 'Moonlight' is the first movie I've seen that's directed by Paula van der Oest, and (again) I fervently hope this is not a typical example of her craft. In 'Moonlight', she shows a penchant for camera set-ups that are distracting and serve no useful purpose. When young Claire feeds her dog, van der Oest plumps for an overhead shot as if we were watching a Busby Berkeley musical. Later, Claire and the fugitive boy break into a house during the resident family's absence, and then attempt some sexual fumblings in the parents' bed ... only to be caught in the act when two people walk in. Van der Oest uses a very contrived camera set-up to make us think that the arrivals are the parents, then uses a reverse angle to reveal that they are actually the family's son and daughter. The switcheroo serves absolutely no purpose except to disorient us. Elsewhere, Claire tells the boy that she's a foundling: is this true, or is it a lie told in a childish attempt to impress him? We never find out. Either way, it's irrelevant to the story.'Moonlight' could have been a straightforward thriller. A boy from an unnamed country (apparently Turkey) has arrived in Luxembourg as a drugs 'mule', his digestive tract packed with condoms filled with narcotic contraband. When he fails to excrete them quickly enough, a drugs runner shoots him and leaves him for dead ... but stupidly doesn't bother to check. The girl Claire finds the boy and helps him, but oddly she never tells her parents about him. (If she's a foundling, they must be her foster parents.) Very implausibly, she runs away from home with the boy, having no clear destination in mind. Are there no police in Luxembourg?The film places some emphasis on pubescent sexuality: Claire experiences her menarche just before she finds the bleeding boy, and there's some attempt to equate her bloodstained knickers with his bloodstained gut. Later, there's a deeply implausible sequence in which the two runaways enrol themselves in a girls' convent school, where the nuns accept them without question. Claire introduces the boy as her sister: he is very clearly male (even while wearing a Communion dress), yet all the nuns and at least one priest automatically accept him as a girl. Speaking of girls' clothing, I could have done without the shot of the Down's Syndrome girl stripping off to her bra and underpants.Obscure joke: Claire's dog is named Quick, and at one point the dog seems to have a stunt double. I couldn't help wondering if the stunt double's name is Flupke. (Americans won't get this reference.)This is one of those movies in which increasingly contrived events keep happening ... and AFTER each one occurs, we realise that it didn't really happen after all: Claire seems to be turning more and more hallucinatory as the film proceeds. At the end of the film, Claire commits suicide by an extremely implausible method. Or ... DOES she? Sheesh!I well and truly wanted to like this film. When director van der Oest puts aside her arty crotchets and she sticks to the story, she shows some genuine narrative talent despite the increasing incoherence of this plot line. In the lead role as Claire, young actress Laurien Van den Broeck is extremely pretty and personable, with significant screen presence. I wish her good luck elsewhere in other projects.If you watch any five consecutive minutes of 'Moonlight', you'll mistake this for a brilliant film. If you watch it from beginning to end, as I did, your response will likely be similar to mine: namely, "HUH?" I wish that all this talent and these resources had been devoted to a more coherent screenplay, and I regretfully rate 'Moonlight' only 4 out of 10.