John is basically a good-hearted man and an affectionate father; but he retreats from his responsibilities into alcoholism and pretty much leaves his son to his own devices.

Ted watches as his father shoots the injured deer, which John takes back to the motel, for the meat.

Ted forms a friendship of sorts with the son, and also creeps into the family's room at night to watch them sleeping.

The couple had been running insurance scams, involving arson, and William's wife died in a house fire.

Later, when everyone has passed out in a drunken stupor (including John) Ted locks the doors from the outside, splashes gasoline everywhere and sets fire to the motel.

Wearing his antler helmet, he stands back to watch the blaze and listen to the screams of the trapped students.

Firefighters eventually put out the blaze, but the motel is completely demolished and everyone has died, including John.

[6] Colombia was chosen due to its tax incentives and the fact that they could afford to build their own set – something not possible in the United States for their budget.

[10] Eric Kohn of IndieWire wrote that the film "maintains a gripping sense of atmospheric dread", although its "consistently grave tone sometimes threatens to suffocate the dramatic momentum",[11] while Schmidlin felt that the film has "extremely effective" parts, but it plays into negative stereotypes of "slow burn" psychological dramas.

[12] These sentiments were echoed by Ain't It Cool News who praised its "dark, broody tone",[13] and by Dennis Harvey of Variety who wrote that the film seemed "endless and dull".

[14] Of the film's director, Craig Macneill, Carson Lund of Slant Magazine wrote, "Even if his talents tip the scales toward overstatement, Macneill has a command for composition and rhythm that belies his skinny résumé, and one can't help but be unnerved by Breeze's relentlessly deer-in-the-headlights performance as the sociopathic Ted.

"[15] Samuel Zimmerman of Shock Till You Drop commended Macneill's restraint and noted that his "disinterest in making a traditional slasher, let alone an iconic one, ultimately ends up with one of the most memorable contemporary iterations.

[17] Dominick Suzanne-Mayer of Consequence of Sound was impressed by the acting and wrote, "If the film itself slips a little too easily into the banality it’s chronicling at times, The Boy is sustained by the measured performances of the handful of wayward souls in its sparse, bleak world.

"[18] Drew Tinnin of Dread Central and Anton Bitel of Sight and Sound both believed that the film rewarded patient viewing.

[20] Andy Webster of the New York Times was impressed overall; he felt that the film worked despite its dramatic shortcomings, and called it "a feature stunning to behold" despite finding it "somewhat unpersuasive in narrative".

[21] However, Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter took an opposing view and wrote, "While it's admirable that director Macneill and his co-scripter Clay McLeod Chapman opted to emphasize mood and psychology over the story's more exploitable elements, it nonetheless results in a listless tedium that isn't helped by the overly long running time.