If you wiggle a pencil fast enough, it appears soft. Rubbery. Made of flesh. It’s only when you reach out and touch the pencil that you realize it’s made of hard wood. In a film, we cannot reach out, we cannot exert force or physical contact, so we rely on cues that the filmmaker plants within the picture; clues that help us distinguish the realm of the real from that of the imaginary. Der Nachtmahr (The Nightmare) is an exercise in distinguishing the real from the imagined through the lens of what is essentially ET’s aborted fetus. If body horror is a genre unto itself, must domestic subhuman cretin horror also be? Der Nachtmahr’s protagonist, Tina Peterson (Carolyn Genzkow), is haunted by a pasty, heavy-breathing test-tube experiment, a creature that is the next natural progression of Henry Spencer’s unbearably mutated babe in arms. At first, bloodcurdling to behold, Tina and the ugly stepbrother of Mac and Me forge an incorrigible bond. Much like Elliot and E.T., their emotional connection transmits physical pain inflicted on the other as if through invisible piano wire. You rap the Gollum-esque creature in the arm and it is Tina who begins to bleed profusely.

The sci-fi-meets-horror chronicle is tucked in amongst a blaringly loud rave culture, set with a blinding forest of florescent strobe lights and an ear-popping tempest of sonic fisticuffs. Steffen Kahles and Christoph Blaser punctuate the underground club scenes with tunes so vibrantly in-your-face that subtitles are required to understand a word any of the characters are saying. Not that you could until you spoke German anyways. As the film initially suggests in its opening title card, Der Nachtmahr contains “extreme strobing” and “isochronic tones” and “binaural frequencies” but should nonetheless be played as loudly as possible. So be warned; Der Nachtmahr is not for the weak, or the epileptic. As the flashmob of lights and loads assault your senses, the quietly percolating body drama is accented that much more when the parties call it and Tina must return to the well manicured emotional scrapyard of her home life.

Surrounding Tina are a crew of friends that play as ciphers for the trouble facing youth today. At its center, Der Nachtmahr is a cautionary tale about coming into adulthood and seeking validation in all the wrong places. About friends who see you crumbling and instead of lending a helping hand, extend the fetid olive branch of another vodka red bull. About the surface level scuzz becoming the forefront of your existence. It’s a lesson in applying just enough makeup to conceal the tattered soul that lies beneath.

But more than anything, Der Nachtmahr is a 7-layer mindfuck. It’s a living, breathing text that, like Eraserhead, ought to be required viewing for any teenager considering themselves “ready” for sexual activity. Fans of the Davids – Cronenberg and Lynch – will discover a real treat in Der Nachtmahr because it isn’t shy about concealing its identity until well after the credits roll. Trying to put a pin in it is like threading a 6mm needle. Be prepared to walk out with your own interpretation because it is not fast to lend you its own.

One can waffle back and forth over the intent of visual-artist-turned-director Akiz‘s vague but scalding narrative. Are we witness to a woman’s looming guilt over an unseen abortion? Are we on the frontlines of a schizophrenic onset? Or are we just privy to a long history of careless drug abuse taking its hallowed toll? On the other side of the fence, could everything we see indeed be real? The lingering questions may frustrate the more rigid, fact-seeking viewers but those willing to dig around within Akiz’s rich subtext are to be treated with something immaculately strange and inexplicably affecting.

CONCLUSION: Like the best surrealist horrors, ‘Der Nachtmahr’ feels no pressure to make you understand its off-kilter tango. Rather, it saunters up to our line of sanity and gladly tiptoes past.