The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things (2004) was a movie based on the bestseller "biography" that was written by J. T. Leroy. The book was based on Leroy's traumatic childhood of living in and out of foster homes and with his unstable mother. But prior to the film's release, it was discovered that the author himself never existed. Though the book was entirely fiction, it was made into a great film.
Directed by and stars Asia Argento as Sarah, Jeremiah’s drug crazed mother. We first see Jeremiah (at age 7 played by Jimmy Bennett), taken away from his foster parents who tried to adopt him, but were denied by his mother. Before Jeremiah knows it, he is given back to Sarah. It becomes clear that something is not quite right with her. The apartment that she lives in is a wreck: very little furniture, no dishes and little food. Jeremiah, not unexpected, is very upset and is in a state of denial of it all. He does not want to be there, he does not believe that the woman he is with is his real mother and he wants to go back to his foster parents, much to the chagrin of Sarah. She in turn, quickly fed up with Jeremiah’s refusal to accept her, becomes abusive, by telling him that it was his foster parents that did not want or love him, thus the reason why they gave him up.
One day Sarah quits her job as a waitress and takes her son on a car ride down a road where the lines of reality and insanity begin to blur. She quickly hooks up with a guy from a bar, leaving Jeremiah in a car waiting. When he does come into the man's apartment, he is told to sleep in the tub where he accidently urinates himself in. Sarah finds out about this and punishes him via the guy from the bar, with a belt. This string of men that Sarah becomes involved with continues until she meets and marries a man named Emerson (Jeremy Renner). Both delinquents leave Jeremiah to fend for himself for two weeks, while both go on their honeymoon. He withdraws into himself and seeks refuge in his imagination as he waits for their return. But when someone does return, it is not who he expects. Emerson, alone and upset, comes in. Sarah apparently has left him, and left Jeremiah in his care. But it is not the type of care that one would get at a would-be stepfather and Jeremiah is abandoned on the streets to be found and taken to a hospital.
When Jeremiah wakes, he is told that his Grandmother (Ornella Muti) has custody of him. She takes him back to their house and into their Evangelical teachings of his Grandfather (Peter Fonda). He is forced to submit into their doctrine which is fanatical and leaves you wondering which family member is he better off with. After three years in their custody, a now older Jeremiah (played by Dylan and Cole Sprouse) is reunited with Sarah. He is taken, without the permission of his grandparents, by her and her new boyfriend where he once more goes down the path that nearly killed him.
At times this was a hard film to watch because some of the scenes are graphic. All of the children that played Jeremiah: Jimmy Bennett, Dylan and Cole Sprouse, did a fantastic job. Asia Argento was excellent in her role as Sarah which was uncanny at times because you have to wonder if she really was going crazy. Though he had only a cameo role, Peter Fonda did well as the Puritanical grandfather. Fonda looked and sounded what one would and you definitely get a sense of what life was like for Sarah, as a child, and eventually Jeremiah.
I recommend this film to those who also enjoy Clean (2006) and The Basketball Diaries (1995).