Children of the Underground

It presents a nuanced and multifaceted look at the jumbled confusion of an era when the exploitation of children was finally treated seriously, and when kids’ defenders were led by amateur advocates figuring things out as they went along.

Throughout, the series circles around the idea of whether Yager did the right thing, asking the same question that people ask of caped crusaders: Who gave you the right to be a vigilante, and take the law into your own hands? That complicated part about Yager and her work drives the series through its murkiness, and makes it expansive storytelling here compelling and harrowing.

Yager isn’t a saint, as the documentary lays out, and viewers are never really given an indication of how the documentarian feels. The audience is left to question Yager’s motives and helping a child go abroad feels like villain territory, no matter the context. But placed against a tearful woman, seen in archival footage, whose own children were kidnapped by Yager, there seems to be more to the story.

It’s all a little disappointing since Cowperthwaite’s Blackfish, whatever flaws it had, spectacularly delivered a cohesive argument and call to action. Instead, Children of Men plays like an instigation for more research and more curiosity.