The bond that develops between an adult and a child who is not biologically theirs is a theme that has periodically appeared with great success throughout film history. In the 1920s we had Charlie Chaplin caring for abandoned orphan Jackie Coogan in The Kid. In the 1930s we had Marie Dressler as the housekeeper devoting herself to her employer’s children in Emma. In the 1940s we had Montgomery Clift as the G.I. who becomes attached to WWII refugee Ivan Jandl in war-torn Berlin in The Search. In the 1950s we had Bing Crosby as a former WWII correspondent feeling paternal toward a boy who may or may not be the missing French child he never knew he had in Little Boy Lost. In the 1960s we had Hardy Kruger as the shell-shocked former soldier in Sundays and Cybele who slowly comes out of his shell when he meets a young girl whose father he pretends to be. In the 1970s we had Simone Signoret as Madame Rosa, the retired prostitute who earns a living caring for the children of working prostitutes. In the 1980s we had Philippe Noiret as the movie projectionist acting as surrogate father to a future filmmaker in Cinema Paradiso. Now after a long dry spell we have The Kid With a Bike.

A co-production of Belgium, France and Italy, The Kid With a Bike from the Belgian Dardenne brothers, Jean-Pierre and Luc, has received numerous awards nominations and wins including Golden Globe and Satellite nominations for Best Foreign Film of 2012.

Newcomer Thomas Doret plays 11 year-old Cyril, who was left at a state-run youth farm by his single parent father (Jérémie Renier) a former petty criminal who is unable to care for the boy after the death of his grandmother. The boy refuses to believe his father has abandoned him even after it’s clear that the father moved leaving no forwarding address and worse, selling the boy’s prize possession, his bicycle. Having run away to find his father, the boy is found at a health clinic where he went to hide from the work farm manager. While there a young woman (Cécile De France) feels sorry for the boy and on her own finds the family the father sold the bicycle to and buys it back and presents it to the boy as a gift. He asks the woman, a hairdresser in the town where his father was last seen, if she would become his guardian on weekends. Moved, she gladly accepts, but it’s just a ploy on his part to spend his weekends riding his bike and continuing his search.

It is, however, the woman who finds the missing father and attempts a reunion at which the father tells him he no longer wants to have anything to do with him. The boy then takes up a petty criminal who acts as a substitute father with disastrous results. Only after all seems lost does the boy realize that the hairdresser is the one who truly cares for him and they are able to enter into a more permanent relationship..

Leisurely paced, yet suspenseful and beautifully played by the three principals, the film which has been released on Blu-ray and standard DVD by Criterion, should gain many new fans now that it has become more accessible to the general public.

Films about teenagers also have a long history in film, but something happened in the 1980s when movies began to dumb down just about everything. Films about high school began to focus entirely on the students, with parents and teachers who if they were portrayed at all, were depicted as idiots. The Perks of Being as Wallflower, which is the best coming-of-age film since 1980’s Oscar winning Ordinary People goes against the trend in giving us an introverted protagonist with an outwardly warm and loving family and a group of fun loving friends, all of whom are good students. The film, which takes place in the early 1990s, celebrates the midnight Rocky Horror Picture Show phenomenon of the era with great élan.

Former child stars Logan Lerman, Emma Watson, Ezra Miller and Mae Whitman head the cast of Stephen Chbosky’s film based on his 1999 novel. Lerman, Watson and Miller have all received well deserved 2012 year-end awards recognition for their performances as has Chbosky for his direction.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is available on both Blu-ray and standard DVD.

Based on Mark O’Brien’s 1990 magazine essay, “On Seeing a Sex Surrogate”, writer-director Ben Lewin’s The Sessions stars John Hawkes as the real-life O’Brien who contracted polio at the age of 8 and lived the remainder of his life in an iron lung. Hawkes’ devotion to the role was such that he permanently injured his spine, not to a great extent but enough to give him recurring pain. The actor’s dedication pays off in a performance that never makes a false note. Helen ”I’m not a prostitute” Hunt does an admirable job as the sex surrogate he hires at the age of 38 with the blessing of his priest. The priest played by William H. Macy is the only character in the film who seems more like a figment of a writer’s imagination than a real person and sure enough, it turns out the character is fictitious, a sounding board for Hawkes’ character much in the way that Thelma Ritter’s fictitious nurse in With a Song in My Heart was a sounding board for Susan Hayward as the real Jane Froman.

There are also excellent performances by Moon Bloodgood and Annika Marks as two of O’Brien’s caregivers.

There has been some controversy over Hunt’s various nominations including her Oscar nomination in the supporting category when she is the film’s de facto leading lady. True enough, but the film is about Hawkes’ character, not Hunt’s, and she doesn’t have as much screen time as he does. It’s one of those roles that could fit comfortably into either category. The real crime is Hawkes’ lack of a Best Actor Oscar nomination.

The Sessoins is available on both Blu-ray and standard DVD.

The enormously successful twenty-third film in the James Bond franchise, Skyfall, is certainly an improvement over the last entry in the series, but it is at its heart the same story as all the others – some lunatic wants to rule the world, causing massive destruction and mounting bodies until he is stopped by the one and only Agent 007. What gives this entry its flair is not so much leading man Daniel Craig as it is the work of supporting players Javier Bardem as a tongue-in-cheek villain and Judi Dench in an expanded role as M. Ben Whishaw as the new Q and Naomie Harris as the new Moneypenny are also most welcome.

Skyfall is available on both Blu-ray and standard DVD.

New releases this week include Ben Affleck’s Argo and Joe Wright’s Anna Karenina.