The MIFF guide describes the film like so: “While on holiday in Tuscany, polite Danes Bjørn and Louise befriend vivacious Dutch couple Patrick and Karin. Their respective children, Agnes and Abel, seem to get along, and the meek Bjørn finds Patrick’s unfiltered machismo appealing. So much so that he jumps at the chance for their families to get together again when, months later, an invitation arrives to visit Patrick and Karin at their rural home in the Netherlands. Indeed, it would be dangerously impolite not to accept.”
This Danish / Dutch co-production has been receiving a lot of positive press recently in the horror community, often regarded as one of the best new horror films of the year. I find that you need to take these kind of recommendations with a grain of salt sometimes, as horror websites are particularly prone to hyperbole, and once they name something as “great”, their increased coverage on that film seem to become an attempt at a self-fulfilling prophecy. That said, I was very happy to see “Speak No Evil” in MIFF's “night shift” line-up and hoped that it would live up to the word-of-mouth I had been hearing about.
Frankly, I was unimpressed by “Speak No Evil” and thought it massively overrated, and there were a few reasons for my dislike. As I have said time and again, for a horror film to really work well, you need to care for its characters and about what happens to them, and I just could not care for any of them in “Speak No Evil”. The quartet of adults were so unlikeable, particularly the “villains” of the film (Patrick and Karin); it was so obvious that their company was toxic or worse, dangerous, that it made no sense that Bjørn and Louise hung around as long as they did. I am usually pretty lenient with the whole “stupid characters making stupid decisions” thing in horror films. It is a staple of the genre and you need it sometimes for the horror to begin. Here though, it really got on my nerves, possibly because their stupidity was not only putting themselves in danger, but also their young daughter too. I will say that at least the Dane family made an attempt to leave when they felt the situation was more than a little off, and they succeed too, but when they turn around and go back, I could not stop rolling my eyes. I must say though that I did find it a little amusing that the reason for them turning back was almost exactly the same situation as a very famous television commercial here in Australia, right down to the stuffed rabbit.
Another big issue I had with “Speak No Evil” is that I worked out the twist almost immediately. You know something is not right with the Dutch couple and because of that, I admit, it is an uncomfortable watch, but because I was sure I knew the twist, the film held no surprises for me; I knew exactly where it was going and how it would end up, almost right up to the final shot. Obviously I have no intention of giving away any of the film's secrets, but by working it out so early, the film was no longer an exercise of discovery for me, it was almost like I was waiting for the film to catch up with me. I am not saying all of this in a “look at me, I'm so clever” way, but rather trying to explain why “Speak No Evil” didn't work for me.
Thinking about it later, I thought that “Speak No Evil” would probably work really well if it was marketed as a straight but uncomfortable drama rather than as a horror film. This way the final half an hour would come as a massive gut punch, but because we know that it is a horror film, we are informed to the fact that it is going to turn at some point and go very bad. The lead up to the horror is also much longer than is the norm, although right from the opening beat, the music by Sune Kølster immediately tells you what type of film you are watching; it is loud, bombastic and very ominous, and in and of itself, I actually really liked the music, but I would never call it subtle.
From a horror perspective, much has been made about the final half an hour of “Speak No Evil”, and yes it is very well done and hits hard. It is incredibly hard to watch, but very effective in what it sets out to do, which is to shock and disturb the audience. Something I have noticed as I get older, my tastes are changing, and this is also true of the horror cinema I like. These days I prefer more atmospheric based horror, as opposed to the extreme horror I used to love when I was younger. As such, I think I would've responded a lot more positively to the brutal and sadistic ending of “Speak No Evil” if I had seen it back then, because while I can see that it has been well done and is very effective, after awhile I felt it bordered on the unnecessarily cruel and started to feel gratuitous. (Yep, I've gone soft in my old age.)
The other big issue I have with Patrick and Karin, the Dutch “villains”, is that we are given no motive for their actions. Whilst I do not think a motive is needed for every horror film, it felt like here that there should have been some explanation to justify their horrible crimes. Without it, the only reasoning you can come away with is that they are just a bunch of homicidal arseholes taking pleasure in other people's pain, but this comes across as lazy and unimaginative writing. I will admit that I found the line “Because you let me” to be absolutely chilling (even if it did feel a bit too close to “The Strangers” “because you were home” line), and it made you want to scream at the protagonists, Bjørn and Louise, even more!: “See?!! You should have fought for yourself and your family more!!! Stop being so damned polite!!!” It makes their decision making throughout the film that much more frustrating too. One interesting thing to note about the actors who play the Dutch couple, Fedja van Huêt and Karina Smulders, is that they are actually married in real life, which explains their chemistry and naturalism together.
Overall, after all the hype I had heard about “Speak No Evil”, I found it to be very overrated. Whilst I agree it has been well made, unfortunately the characters are either unlikeable or so frustrating in their decision making, that I just did not enjoy being in their company for the film's 97 minute running time, nor did I care about what happened to them. “Speak No Evil” is an uncomfortable watch, but for me, it was also a very frustrating watch, with the lead-up to the “good stuff” taking far too long to get there. The last half an hour hits very hard and it is quite confronting, so be prepared for it, as it gets nasty. While the film did not work for me, it seemed to play better for most of the MIFF audience I saw it with, so take that how you will, but for me I was sadly left disappointed by “Speak No Evil”.
2.5 Stars.
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