There are certain moments in life when everything in our body tells us to run away from a situation but we still hesitate because we want to be polite. Maybe it’s a weird conversation with a glassy-eyed drunk we got trapped in at a fundraiser. Or a flirtation turned suddenly uncomfortable with some girl we met at a bar. We don’t want to hurt the feelings of strangers. We stay out of some bizarre (and overly trusting) Western societal norm. We afford the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes to those who have not earned it. In Speak No Evil, all kinds of instinctual alarms go off but no one is paying attention to their instinct. They’re playing right into the hands of societal expectation – and then they are exploited.
Writer-director Christian Tafdrup has crafted a knockout gut-punch about the lengths that people will go to not offend in this self-described “satirical horror.” Tafdrup calls this “correctness culture”. He defines this as, “a culture in which we are willing to sacrifice ourselves in the attempt of behaving like proper human beings.” Sacrifice indeed. Tafdrup’s supremely uncomfortable dictate is both utterly, painfully recognizable and wholly interactive as translated to film, basically inviting audiences to shout, “Get out of there!” over and over again at their screens. There’s a purity to this kind of horror movie but Tafdrup contorts the formula to expert effect.
It begins, as it always does, quite pleasantly. Danish couple Bjørn (Morten Burian) and Louise (Sidsel Siem Koch) are on holiday in Tuscany with their young daughter. They meet the charming Patrick (Fedja Van Huêt) and his kind wife Karin (Karina Smulders), a Dutch couple on vacation with their about-the-same-aged son. A few months later, an invitation arrives in the mail from Patrick and Karin, inviting their new friends to visit.
As the Danish couple reunite with their fast Dutch friends at their countryside home in the Netherlands, things aren’t as they expected. The once complimentary and friendly Patrick and Karin turn strange in their own home. They keep insisting the vegetarian Louise eat meat. Their disciplinary tactics with their son are uncomfortable, over-the-top. When they all go out to eat one night, Patrick gets blind drunk and drives recklessly the whole way home. Patrick and Karin poke and prod at the invisible boundaries of civility before just stepping over them wholesale. As their fight or flight beacons blink on and off, Bjørn and Louise can’t determine if their new “friends” are just eccentric or if there’s something very very wrong. When in doubt, escape.
But every time a line is crossed, Patrick and Karin retreat and apologize. They tuck back into their understanding, sensitive sides, manipulating and pulling the forgiving, overly-polite Danes further into their web. Tafdrup’s sinister slow-build is a testament to the seductive power of saying the things that people want to hear. He broaches the idea of toxic politeness with jarring devilishness: we only endure what we allow people to do to us. Repeat that: we only endure what we allow people to do to us.
Drawing from his own childhood experience where his family visited new friends and “put up” with a weekend worth of inappropriate and unpleasant behavior, Tafdrup strikes a chord by creating a recognizable scenario and then injecting abject horror into it. Showing flashes of Michael Haneke and Lars von Trier, Tafdrup toys with his audience, building things slowly and with an impressive level of precision. What perhaps is so startlingly scary about all this is just how recognizable so much of is is. Which is always the best formula for pure nightmare fuel. Tafdrup’s family suffered through a vacation with what were essentially strangers because they didn’t have the gall to put their foot door, jump in the car, and GTFO of there. Bjørn and Louise suffer too.
Tafdrup proves a steady-handed maestro behind the camera, building tension to impossible levels and then – somehow – still finding a next gear. Grounded in the four outstanding performances from his tight cast, Tafdrup’s film evokes both the will-they-won’t-they tension of Patrick Brice’s The Overnight and the psychological mindfuckery of Michael Haneke’s Funny Games. Except Tafdrup doesn’t “cheat” to get his intended effect. There’s no need to rewind events as every skillfully-placed brick is laid so as to turn his audience to putty in his hand. Much as Patrick and Karin slowly but surely turn Bjørn and Louise to putty themselves. As days of cringy interactions turns suddenly bone-chilling, the air in the room drops five degrees. Folks, this movie gets scary.
By the time the credits were rolling, Speak No Evil had utterly wiped me out. I was left emotionally drained, nothing left in the tank, anticipating sleepless hours of nightmarish tossing and turning. Mission accomplished. Because great horror requires participation, there is a sacred contract between a creator and their audience. The audience allows the creator to disturb them. Wills it even. Good horror asks a profound question: where do the boogeymen lie in our lives? Great horror answers it by looking within. Tafdrup has crafted something great because he looks within to reflect a reality we too so often experience. We only endure what we allow people to do to us. It is only the very rare occasion that a horror film leaves me speechless – and I admit to actively seeking out films that can have that profound effect on me. Speak No Evil delivered this horror nut into stunned silence.
CONCLUSION: A spiritual sequel to Michael Haneke’s ‘Funny Games’, Christian Tafdrup’s ‘Speak No Evil’ presents audiences with domestic discomfort and slowly cranks up the temperature. Like frogs in a boiling pot of water, we don’t know that we’re cooked until it’s much too late.
A
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By: Matt Oakes
Started blogging about film in college when the university paper wouldn’t have him. Dislikes your consensus film Twitter favorites. Devotee of horror movies that make him die a little inside. Catches films at festivals when he can. Proud SFCS and OFCS member and Tomatometer-approved critic. Editor-in-chief of Silver Screen Riot.
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