Speak No Evil (Christian Tafdrup, 2022)

Buckle yourself in — this is one hell of a trip

Recently remade for American audiences by James Watkins (perhaps unnecessarily as the Danish/Dutch original is mostly in English anyway), Speak No Evil is one of those films that must not just be seen, it must be experienced.

And what a stressful experience it is.

From the early scenes of the two families meeting cute on holiday in Italy onward — which include pangs of horror score to telegraph from the beginning that something bad cometh — this film produces such anxiety, such tension, that you’ll need a minute to shake it off after the credits roll.

And even then, it will continue to skritch and scratch inside your mind.

Speak No Evil is a horror movie that lingers. Perhaps because it’s just all-too terrifyingly plausible.

A Danish couple, Bjørn and Louise, on vacation with their 11-year-old daughter, Agnes, become summer friends with a Dutch family; Patrick, Karin, and their 11-year-old son, Abel.

Listless Bjørn in particular is enamored with the uninhibited Patrick, so when Patrick and Karin extend an invitation to Bjørn, Louise, and Agnes to come visit them at their home in the rural Netherlands, it is Bjørn that pushes the resistant Louise to accept the idea.

Patrick and Karin’s home is way out in the countryside, with no neighbors of note. And while they welcome their Danish friends into their household, from the off it’s obvious this is not quite the same family they met previously.

Of course, they were on vacation then; now they’re living their everyday norm — and playing hosts to boot…

But that’s just the first of many rationalizations our protagonists employ to try and explain away the many strange incidents and odd behaviors that occur.

Speak No Evil walks the knife edge of a dark comedy of sorts that feels very Ruben Östlund, dealing as it does with notions of social norms and politeness (just how much incivility should one endure before risking rudeness yourself by trying to put a stop to it?) and, yes, outright nightmarish horror.

Because this is very much a horror film.

This Dutch family are very bad people. And the Danish family squander every opportunity to escape; through a combination of justifications for their hosts’ insolent behavior, plain old bad luck, and all manner of classic horror protagonist mistakes.

Stressful, unsettling, and incredibly dark, Speak No Evil is an awesomely effective phycological thriller of a horror movie that will continue to live in your head rent free for long after it ends.

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